Broken
by RMTNDEW
Summary: Death is a funny thing, sometimes you don't know you like someone until their gone, or in my case, love someone. Sequel to 'Unbreakable' How is Logan coping with his loss and is he going crazy?
1. Here By Me

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to anything Marvel. I actually don't own the rights to anything, full stop, but we shall over look that for the time being, as it really has nothing to do with this.

Sidenote: This is a sequel to my story 'Unbreakable', although you don't have to read it to understand this one, it might help. I also suggest that if you're going to read it, I would do so before reading this one as it might sort of...spoil it for it, I suppose. Oh and a bit of a warning, if you're not good with candid talks about death, I suggest that you don't read this, as there's quite a bit of it in here.I've also added lyrics to it, like I did in another one of my stories, I do hope that doesn't bother anyone.Anyway, I hope you all enjoy reading it and that I did the first one justice. On with the story!

* * *

Broken

Death is a funny thing; sometimes you don't realize that you like someone until they're gone, or, in my case, love someone. But I didn't lose someone, not right then. However, there was a man that I loved, his name was Logan and he did everything he could to protect me and take care of me. He would go out of his way to make me happy and to see me smile. He knew me better than anyone else and gave up something that he wanted so that I wouldn't risk the possibility of getting hurt. I loved him, I wanted him to love me and yet he was scared that he would hurt me like the other woman in his past. It wasn't until I lay dying in his arms that he realized that perhaps taking the jump and getting hurt in the fall is worth the experience of the jump alone, but at that time, it was too late; the gun shot wound in my stomach had gone straight through, causing me to lose too much blood. With the ambulance only one minute away, it sirens filling the air with a loud, urgent sound, I died I died, but he clung to my cold, lifeless body, rocking me back and forth, switching between muttering how sorry he was for letting me get hurt and cursing me for leaving him. Even as the hauled me away in the ambulance, the unexpected shock of my untimely death griping at him, he lit up a cigar and calmly drove to the hospital where the pronounced me dead. Co-workers and friends of ours, Scott and Jean, came down to make sure that he was okay, and then they went home and, along with Professor Xavier, planned my funeral. I apologize, my name is Chloe, and I was a mutant who lived and worked in a school just for them. I was twenty-two and that summer I was supposed to be going to Canada with Logan. Unfortunately, my plans were cut short as my father, who had been in prison for thirteen years of my life for killing a fourteen year old mutant boy, shot me and point blank range for also being a mutant, and that's how I died. It hurt, my word did it hurt, but Logan being there, holding me, telling me that I was going to be okay, it didn't stop the pain, it did, however, make me feel just a little bit better. My life was over, done with and it wasn't until then that Logan knew that he loved me but would never be able to tell me, and that ate him alive.

"Hey Logan, we're drivin' to the funeral home, do you wanna' right with us?" Rogue called through Logan's door.

"No," he called back.

Admittedly, I didn't get along quite so well with Rogue while I was alive, but now I see that she never meant any harm. The problem with our relationship was that we both wanted to be the center of Logan's attention. I had been when I had first met him when I was fifteen and then he left the bar that we both worked in, he as a cage fighter and I as a bartender, taking Rogue with him as they both wound up at Xavier's. After that, there were six years where Rogue was everything that brought him home and kept him waking up every day. Then the night before she got married, I met Logan again and it was as though I was his new pet since she belonged to Bobby. I was back to being his center, his everything, and she was jealous because she thought that I had stolen _him_ from _her_, when he was thinking that Bobby was stealing _her_ from _him_. All a vicious cycle really. Anyway, the point is that it doesn't matter who stole who from whom, I was grateful that she was taking care of him for me, as much as he was letting her, anyway, he needed it.

"Well, do you want me to ride with you?" she asked.

"No, I'm fine kid, go on," he said, suppressing a growl as he knew she meant well.

It had taken two days to plan my funeral, during those two days Logan had barely slept, and when he had, it wasn't long before he would have a nightmare and wake up. But the weren't his usual nightmares of being cut open and being injected with a melted metal called adamantium just to be used as some type of weapon. It wasn't about the life that he had spent nearly twenty-two years tying to remember. Instead, he was having nightmares of me dying in his arms, but both nights he had had the dreams, in them I was blaming him for letting me die. I didn't blame him and wished that there had been a way for me to tell him.

"Are you sure?" Rogue asked, feeling bad knowing that he was grieving but wouldn't let anyone see it.

"Yeah, I'm goin' on my own," he said, trying again, not to growl.

"Alright, we'll just see you there, then," she said and then left.

Logan went to his bathroom and took a swig of the bottle of Jack Daniels he had bought, along with three others, the day before. He had already gone through the other three and was working his way through the forth, having already gotten more than half way through. He sat the bottle down on the counter and placed both of his hands on the sides of the sink, trying to force himself to not pack his things, get in his car and drive away from there as fast as he could, as far as he could. He had never been to a funeral, not one that he could remember, anyway. When they had thought that Jean was dead after she was swept away in the floods when the dam broke in Alkali Lake, he had attended the memorial service on just two bottles of Jack, but there, with the body, he wasn't sure that he could do it. He had seen a lot of things, done a lot, but witnessing the woman he loved suffering and dying had haunted him worse than anything in his life.

He looked up and studied himself in the mirror. He didn't see what I had once seen; a man of great strength, talent and a certain animalistic appeal that would either push you from him, or draw you closer. A man whom in my life time, however short of one it might have been, I had come to depend on as my sole love interest. I loved him but it was so much more than a romantic relationship; he was my best friend, my playmate, my partner in crime, my TV buddy. I loved Scott but I couldn't sit through his boring dramas that he insisted on watching; Logan watched The Three Stooges movies with me. He had let me curl up next to him during the Halloween season when the school had a 'Fright Night Movie Fest' and we watched the original version of 'The House on Haunted Hill'. Admittedly, the special effects were no longer that great, I was still scared and he had let me squeeze his hand all too tightly and burry my face into his chest when someone would be killed, never complaining, only laughing. He didn't see a man with accomplished skills, with perfect grace, the way that I had when I had first seen him fight. He did it with such beauty. I know you're probably wondering how someone could fight with grave and beauty, but when I had had the pleasure of watching him every day, every week for three months; I was struck by how he seemed to look as though he were dancing. He looked as though he were in a ballet, moving fluidly and naturally to win every match. He certainly didn't see the soft, vulnerable Logan that I had seen the night that I had kissed him or the night that I first heard him tell me that he loved me. That Logan was gone; he had to let Wolverine take over or he was going to lose it, he was going to crack. As he stood there, gripping the side of the sink with so much strength that it threatened to rip from the wall; he didn't see anything but pure rage. Sure, he was in pain, but he wouldn't have been that way had my father not killed me and so he was enraged by the thought of him. Logan wanted to scream, yell, to go running out into the streets cutting open any man who even resembled my father, and yet he couldn't. He was bound by a promise that I had made him make to me to not go after him. Stupid promise, really, it probably would have been the only way for him to have gotten some of his emotions out, but I wanted my father to go to prison, once again, not Logan. I know that Logan would have gladly traded years of his life behind bars to see that man gutted with his head mounted on a wall as a trophy and a reminder as to not mess with the people in his life. However, it was more than just not wanting him to go to jail; I knew that if he did then he would have been found out about being a mutant. You see, Logan ages well; the Professor had at one point told me that the estimation of his age was near one hundred years, however, he only looked as though he were in his thirties, late, maybe even early forties, but still good for someone more than twice his age. If he had gotten time in prison for murder, he would have barely aged by the time he was through serving his sentence and therefore would have outed himself. Mutants are looked down on, frowned upon, and even spit upon, not to mention hated. Those who have lived our lives know this and need not hear my explanation. But, for those of you who don't know; I made Logan promise me to not hunt my father down and kill him because in the end, I would much rather my father get away with murder than to have my Wolverine prodded and picked over by the Government, who would, not doubt, want to use him for themselves. He was created to be a human weapon, an animal, but he wasn't. He was my kind, gentle, strong and caring Logan and there was no way that they were going to try and turn him into something he wasn't. No, when Logan looked into the mirror and stared into his own eyes, all he could see was a man doing his best not to break down and cry.

_I woke up today  
Woke up wide awake  
In an empty bed  
Staring at an empty room  
I have myself to blame  
For the state I'm in today  
And now dying  
Doesn't seem so cruel  
And oh, I don't know what to say  
And I don't know anyway  
Anymore _

I hate myself for losing you  
I'm seeing it all so clear  
I hate myself for losing you  
What do you do when you look in the mirror  
And staring at you is why she's not here?

The ride to the funeral home was long and hard for everyone. Jean, Scott and Ororo all drove school busses to bring in most of the students. The Professor rode with Bobby and Rogue, and Logan drove himself. No one dared ask him to drive the other bus, and so some of the students volunteered to stay at the school on their own and watch after some of the younger students that the Professor had suggested stay at home.

The chapel was full of thick tension, no one knowing what Logan would do, and trying to stay clear of him, just in case. He sat in the front, keeping his eyes on me inside of my coffin as Xavier delivered a beautiful eulogy. He spoke about how much he had seen me grow since I had arrived, about how I had taken control of my life and was never embarrassed to ask about something that I was curious about, always continuing to learn. He spoke such wonderful things that nearly everyone was crying by the time he was done. Once he was through, they allowed everyone to pass by and view me. I always found that bit slightly odd; everyone was lining up to see the empty shell that I had left behind, knowing that it was no longer me lying there, because I was gone. Logan was the last to go through and Scott waited by only a few feet away, in case that he needed him. Scott was the only one who had understood him, the only person to look him in the eye when they spoke. Logan and Scott had never gotten along, for whatever reason, but right then, Scott was the closest thing to understanding him and it didn't matter how badly they fought and argued; Scott stood up there beside him because he knew that that was what he had needed.

Everyone watched Logan as he stood above my lifeless body, waiting to see what he would do. He ran his hand down my cold, dead cheek, skimming my bottom lip with the pad of his thumb, cupping my face in his palm. He then pent down and kissed my forehead, stroking my curly hair with his hand.

"I love you darlin'," he whispered so quietly, with his lips still pressed to the top of my head, that only those who knew what was going on inside his head could have known what he was saying. "You'll always be my girl," He placed another kiss on my cheek, rose up and then closed the lip to my coffin.

He, Scott, Bobby and another one of their former students named Peter, or Colosious, who had come back for the funeral, were the pallbearers, picked up my casket, and carried it to the hearse. Everyone then drove to the cemetery, where no one spoke; they only buried me. After everyone had placed a flower on my grave, they left, except for Logan.

"Hey kid," he started. "Look, I'm not really good at this sort of thing, but I'm sorry. You shouldn't be there. I should have been watching you, takin' care of you; I didn't listen to any of my instincts and screwed up…again. I was stupid, I'm used to putting my own life on the line but this time it wasn't just me…it was you. I should have been paying attention, I should have…I should have done something. Why were you talkin' to him? Why didn't you tell at me? Why did you just stand there and let him do that to you? Why did you let him take you away from me?" he yelled, letting out a string of swear words before continuing. "He took you away from me the first time. If you hadn't made me take you to Washington than nothing would have happened that night and I would have got to keep you, why couldn't I keep you? I know that I told you that I didn't want to…be with you because I didn't want to hurt you, but the truth is, kid, I was afraid that you would start to see me the way that I do and that you wouldn't want me anymore. When I looked at you I knew that you didn't see me the way that I do, you thought I was better than what I am, you gave me more love than I deserved and I let you die. Why couldn't you have just hated me, why did you have to forgive me? That was your problem Chloe; you forgave people too easily. You let people hurt you and then you just forgave them, why did you do that?" he said, running his hand through his hair and letting out a heavy sigh that threatened to be a growl. "I hope you're alright now, you deserve to be okay, even if it's killin' me, you deserve it. Do you know how much I miss you already? You've been gone for two days and already I can't stand it. If after two days I'm goin' crazy without you, how am I supposed to keep goin' on? I've gotta' go kid, I know you're not in that bottle of Jack I got in the car, but I don't guess it'll hurt to check. I'm sorry darlin', I wish I could have done more, but I just wasn't fast enough. Get some rest, I'll be back to see you later," he said and then walked to his car. He pulled the bottle of whiskey from the back seat and proceeded to drink the rest by the time he had driven the twenty or so minutes back to the school, but once he was there, he couldn't go in.

He swore. '_She's not in there, she's never gonna' be in there 'cause she's gone for good,' _he thought. _'She ain't ever comin' back, so get used to it,'_

But he couldn't. He turned his car around and drove away. He went to the bar that was nearly half an hour away from the mansion but left as he remembered bringing me there and the argument that we had once had in the parking lot. After driving around for almost an hour he finally cursed himself, pulled over at a Liquor store and just bought him some more whiskey.

"Oh wow, you must be having a party or something," the female cashier said as he put the bottles up onto the counter. She was young, only in her early twenties. She had light brown hair and big brown eyes. _My_ big brown eyes; the ones that he had loved staring into.

"No," he nearly growled, pulling out his wallet to pay for the three bottles he was buying. He figured that since the funeral was over with, he wouldn't need as much to keep him going.

"Oh, this is all for you, how do you drink this stuff, it makes me sick,"

"Doesn't bother me," he said, hording up his bag in his arms, not bothering to wait for his change and then heading for the door.

"Hey Chloe, are you coming to my party tonight?" a young man asked.

Logan turned to see him speaking on a cell phone and felt the sudden urge to run his claws through him for saying my name. He didn't, however, instead he went back to his car and finally drove to the school.

Logan was relearning a hard lesson that he had forgotten since having Jean back; when you lose someone you love, you see them everywhere. Mine wasn't an all too common name, but as it had been for the six years we went without seeing each other, he heard every mention of my name from everyone who said it. However, the mention of my name no longer brought up thoughts of guilt and regret as much as it brought up pain. The sound of the same name that had once brought comfort to his broken soul felt sharp and painful to his ears to hear since I was gone, and he sought salvation from the anger in a bottle of whiskey and a cigar as he sat out on his terrace as the sun began to set.

"Hey, mind if I sit down?" Rogue asked, appearing at his side.

"Yeah, go on," he said, pulling a chair closer to his. She sat down and pulled her sweater closer to her.

The early February weather was still near freezing cold in New York. It was snowing, very lightly, but enough to blow back in the wind to duck their outstretched feet with it. The blush winter lighting case itself over the back grounds of the school' property, where Logan had a clear view of the woods, which hid their pond. As the sun was setting, the moon began to shine brighter, making everything below look colder than it was.

They both sat quietly for a minute before Rogue finally began to speak. "I'm sorry. I know that we didn't get along all that well, but I never wanted her to…I'm sorry,"

He took a puff of his cigar. "Don't worry about it kid, it's not your fault,"

"If you ever wanna' talk about her, I don't care, you can,"

He nodded his head. "I know," he said and then looked over at her. "It's cold, you better go in,"

"I'm fine,"

"You don't look fine," he said, noticing his slightly chattering teeth.

"Just let me sit out here for a while, I don't want to go back in right now,"

He took a sip from his bottle. "So how are we doin' then?"

He didn't say it, but she knew that he was talking about her and Bobby. "Fine," she said, wrapping her scarf around her tighter.

"So you worked out the whole New Year's Eve deal?" Rogue had kissed Logan on New Year's Eve instead of her husband Bobby. Partly because Logan was her friend and she didn't see anything wrong with it, but also in part because I was standing there and she wanted to make me jealous. It had worked. I tore up the stairs to my bedroom with Logan right behind me.

"Yeah, he knows that I didn't mean it like that, I just think that some times he forgets that we're different,"

"Good," he said with another sip of his whiskey.

There was another long silence as Rogue pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them. She rested her head on them and looked over at Logan. "Were you in love with her?"

He fought back to urge to make her leave. He knew it was an innocent question, she didn't know it was going to hurt him, but the truth was; it _did_ hurt him, the question nearly killed him.

He ground his teeth down on his cigar, trying to keep his emotions under control. "Yeah, I was," he said, letting out a long breath into the cold air, making it hard to tell the difference between it and his cigar smoke.

"Was she in love with you?"

Logan loved Marie, she knew it, everyone knew it, but right then he was doing all he could to keep calm and from growling at her. "Yeah, I think so,"

"Why didn't the two of you ever do anything about it, then?"

"Because I'm stupid,"

"You're not stupid Logan, you've done some stupid things but that doesn't mean that you are," she said.

He looked over at her and nodded his head. "Come here, kid," he said, pulling her to him from her chair and kissing her on top of the head. "You shouldn't have to take care of me; I'm an old man,"

"Well I reckon I don't do anything I don't want to," she said. "And besides, you've taken care of me for long enough, I think it's your turn for a while,"

Logan had lost me but he still had Rogue and that's what he had to focus on.

"So, do we got anything to eat in this place?" he asked.

"Yeah, I think dinner was almost done when I came up here,"

"We better go then," he said, but continued to hold her to him.

Marie thought about how Logan was the only person, aside from Bobby, to not care about touching her skin. He had even touched her purposefully on occasion to help save her life. He had taken care of her during a time in her life when it was needed most and she hated watching him try to drown himself in a bottle that would do nothing to him to help him deal with my death.

"You might want to use some mouth wash; I'm not sure how much the Professor would want you smellin' like whiskey at the dinner table,"

"Chuck can get over it," he said, finally letting out a small growl. Rogue didn't move, she knew that it wasn't directed at her and she had gotten used to the various growls and noises that he often made, especially when irritated. "You know what; I'm not hungry, why don't you go eat and we can talk later,"

"Are you sure?" she asked, looking up at him.

"Yeah, I'm gonna' sit out here for a little while,"

"Alright, I'll see you later," she said, standing and walking to the door that led back into his room. "Hey Logan?"

"Yeah?" he asked, not minding to turn around and look at her.

"If you need to talk you know you can come get me,"

"I know. Thanks kid,"

"Logan,"

"Yeah Marie?"

"I love you,"

"I know, you too," he said then tipped back his bottle and drank the last of the whiskey as she left, closing his bedroom door as quietly as she could.

He contemplated getting up and getting a new bottle, but he couldn't force himself from his seat. He sat there smoking on the small bit of cigar that was left, as the last of the sun sank smoothly behind the large thicket of trees just out beyond his balcony. He wanted to get me off his mind, but he saw me everywhere he looked. I was there out on the terrace with him, sitting right beside him. I was inside his bedroom, begging him to let me try on his cowboy boots like I used to. I was out in the yard below him. He could see me standing in front of the snowman that I had made earlier that week. I had tried to give him the winged hair that Logan had, but the snow hadn't worked with me and he had just ended up looking like I didn't know how to make a snowball. His eyes were, unfortunately, made from very mismatched rocks, because I hadn't been able to find but the two of them hidden under all of the snow. His nose had been made from a knob of a stick that I had broken into little bits to make a smile. He was a goofy looking guy, but at least he was upbeat about it. Logan saw me down there, smiling at him and he could help but cry, knowing that he would never be able to see me smile for real ever again.

_I hope you're doing fine out there without me  
'Cause I'm not doing so good without you  
The things I thought you'd never know about me  
Were the things I guess you always understood_

So how could I have been so blind for all these years?  
Guess I only see the truth through all this fear,  
And living without you…

And everything I had in this world  
And all that I'll ever be  
It could all fall down around me.  
Just as long as I have you,  
Right here by me.

I can't take another day without you  
'Cause baby, I could never make it on my own  
I've been waiting so long, just to hold you  
And be back in your arms where I belong

Sorry I can't always find the words to say  
But everything I've ever know gets swept away  
Inside of your love…

And everything I had in this world  
And all that I'll ever be  
It could all fall down around me.  
Just as long as I have you,  
Right here by me.

As the days grow long I see  
That time is standing still for me  
When you're not here

Sorry I can't always find the words to say  
Everything I've ever known gets swept away  
Inside of your love

And everything I had in this world  
And all that I'll ever be  
It could all fall down around me.  
Just as long as I have you,  
Right here by me. 


	2. Black Dress

Disclaimer: Though I don'town any of the rights to Marvel, I have a lot of fun pretending that I do. The lyrics to the song in this chapter is called 'Black Dress', although I don't know who sings it and I've never actually _heard_ the song, I loved the lyrics and thought it was quite fitting. Please enjoy!

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Haylie Robbins was twenty-six years old and though I wouldn't call her pampered, everyone else would, as I'm trying to be polite and give an unbiased view. But, if I were to be giving my own, personal opinion on her, I would say that she was about as spoiled as any one single person could get. She had never worked a day in her life and as far as she was concerned, never would. However, if you were to ask her what contribution she made to society, she would willingly list all of the charities in which she and her family were involved. But it doesn't count as work when you show up to a charity ball in your brand new sports car, wearing designer clothes and giving air kisses to the other pampered brats whose family had raised them to believe that they were better than everyone because they had money. They all showed up only to show off. It made their families look good, even when not everything really _was_ quite as perfect as they were making everything seem. That's what I _would _say if I weren't being the mediator between stories, so as far as you know; she's a nice, well behaved young lady of society…or something like that.

Haylie Robbins was a very wealthy person, a wealth that at one point in my life I might have envied. My mother would play the lottery when I was younger and she would always say; 'Money can't buy happiness but it can sure make you feel comfortable while you're lonely.' I was never the wealthiest person growing up; my stepfather controlled all of the money that he and my mother made and then when they both died, I was sent to live with my aunt who took all of the money I got from the deaths and the selling of our old house and kept it for herself. From then, I lived in foster care and then with a foster family. I lived in quite a few different places between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two, keeping jobs in bars when I could. It wasn't until I moved into the mansion and began work there that I started getting enough of a paycheck to buy what I wanted, but I was very careful with how I spent it because it was what I had _earned_. Haylie knew nothing about earning the money that she so eagerly spent. Her father, who had adopted her when she was young, owned a chain of hotels along the west coast and was the result of their success.

She was beautiful; she had long, wavy black hair, bright blue eyes and a pale skin that looked pretty, instead of sickly. She was fairly tall; around five foot eight and she know exactly how gorgeous everyone thought she was and she believed it. I was never the prettiest girl in the world, but I had come to except my looks and eventually ended up liking myself and who I was, despite my flaws, she, however, didn't quite share my views. Flaws were not expectable in her world, they were meant to be put away and hidden from everyone, to be kept on a shelf high above everyone's view where they could only see how 'perfectly perfect' she was.

You may be wondering who Haylie Robbins is and why you should care about her? To be quite honest, I didn't know myself, but as she walked up the front steps of the school the next day, the males there sure were interested in finding out as much about her as they could.

"Miss Robbins, I trust that you found you way here with no problems?" Professor Xavier said as he greeted her at the door.

"Yes, I found my way fine," she said with a bright smile.

"Good, follow me, there's quite a bit we have to talk about," he said and then led her into his office where Jean and Ororo were waiting. "Miss Robbins these are two of my teachers, Dr. Jean Grey and Ororo Munroe,"

"Hello, it's nice to meet you, you can call me Haylie," she said, sitting down.

"Well Haylie, I apologize that you had to find out this news at such a terrible time, but I thought you would like to know,"

"And I appreciate you calling me, I just wish I could have been here yesterday for the funeral but my father was hosting a charity action that I had promised to help with and I just couldn't make it in time," she said. "Now, what exactly did you want me to do, go through her things and sale them or give them away?"

Jean and Storm exchanged glances.

"Actually, we thought we would leave that up to Logan," Xavier said.

"Who's Logan?" she asked and right on cue, the door to the Professor's office swung open and Logan, clad in sweatpants and an A-Shirt, burst into the room.

"What do you want Chuck, I'm busy," he said, standing, hands across his chest.

Haylie wasn't used to loud, scary looking men and Logan took up the field in that category. She was slightly struck by his presence that he made in the room, but what's more, she was struck by the fact that he hadn't even seem to notice her.

"Logan, I would like for you to meet Haylie Robbins, she will be staying with us for a while," the Professor said and he finally gave her a short glance.

"Hi, it's nice to meet you," she said, standing to shake her hand.

He responded with a low growl and she backed away. "What does this have to do with me?" he asked.

"It doesn't,"

"They why did you call me in here?" he asked. "I'm not in the mood for one of your little tea parties so if this is all you wanted me for, I'm leavin'," he said, walking to the door.

"Logan, this has to do with Chloe," said the Professor, stopping him where he stood. He slowly turned back around to face him.

"What about her?"

"Miss Robbins would like to know more about her and I thought that you would be the best person to tell her,"

"Why does she want to know about her?" he asked, looking at Haylie suspiciously.

"Haylie was Chloe's sister,"

"Chloe never said she had a sister, she said she didn't have any family,"

"Although Haylie knew of Chloe, I'm afraid that Miss Rynolds wasn't aware of her. Their father never told her mother about her,"

"Miss Rynolds, I thought it was Wells?" Haylie asked.

"Wait a minute, what do you mean _their_ father?" asked Logan.

"Chloe changed her last name when she was eighteen to her mother's maiden name. Haylie's mother was engaged to her father when she was born and he left them to go to Seattle Washington, where he met Chloe's mother,"

The news, however unexpected it may have been to him, wasn't enough to keep him from flinching with every mention of my name. "Where is he?" Logan growled at Haylie, making her shrink back some.

"Logan, calm down," Jean said, stepping forward to separate him from Haylie.

"Where is he?" Logan repeated, trying to lower his voice.

"She doesn't know," the Professor said. "But I would thank you to keep your calm in front of our guests; there is no need to get hostile, Logan,"

"Well excuse me, but I'm not really in the mood for makin' new friends at the moment, so in less you've got something else I need to know, I'm leavin',"

"Logan, I think it would serve you better if you were to talk about her, to tell Haylie about her, rather than spending all day in the gym; that's not going to help you," the Professor said.

"Well Chuck, you deal with it in your way and I'll deal with it in mine," Logan said, finally walking from the room and slamming the door behind him.

"I apologize Miss Robbins, Logan was very close to your sister and her death has, I'm afraid, affected him the most. The other members of my staff and I will do what we can to tell you as much about her as we can, but I was hoping that he would be more willing to speak to you. He knew her when she was younger, a teenager, I thought he might be able to tell you more about her than we can,"

"No, it's fine, but why is he so mad at our real father?"

Jean, Storm and the Professor exchanged glances once more. "You father was the one that shot Chloe, he killed her,"

* * *

"Why did you leave me? I trusted you to take care of me, the Professor trusted you and you left me. All you had to do was watch me, something so _simple_ and yet you couldn't do it. You screwed up Logan, big time. How could I have ever thought that _you_ would actually keep your promises?" I said.

"Chloe, I'm sorry, I didn't know that something was gonna' happen to you. I was tryin' to take care of you; I wanted you here with me,"

"Why? You didn't love me, you didn't care about me, you never did,"

"No, I loved you, I still do darlin',"

"Then why did you let me die?"

Logan woke up in a cold sweat, panting. He had had another nightmare, another dream where I was blaming him for me death. He looked at his watch; he had only been sleeping for two hours, it was just after midnight. He would have gone back to sleep, but he knew he wouldn't be able to rest, so he got up from his bed and pulled on an A-Shirt before heading out into the hall. He was going to make his usual rounds that he made when he couldn't sleep, but as he walked past my door, he stopped. Someone was in there and for a second his heart sped up; he thought that maybe it had _all_ just been a bad dream, maybe I was still alive and he hadn't lost me.

He carefully opened the door to my bedroom and stepped inside. The light was on; he took in the state of my room, noticing the dirty clothes piled up in my hamper, my unmade bed, and the door to my bathroom left open. The door to my closet was open and he remembered me closing it the day that I had died and wondered if Jean had left it open when she had picked out the outfit that I had been buried in. He inhaled the scent and knew there was something foreign in there. It wasn't my smell, nor was it Dr. Grey's, Ororo's or Rogue's. He had almost dismissed it until he heard a sound from my closet. He walked over to it and saw Haylie standing there, looking through my clothes.

"What are you doin' in here?" Logan growled from behind her.

She spun around on her heels, wide eyed with shock. "They told me this was Chloe's room, I just wanted to look around," she defended.

"Don't touch her things,"

"I was just trying to see if I could find out anything about her from her room,"

"I don't care; I don't want you touching her stuff,"

"Who are you? Mr. Xavier told me that you knew her when she was a teenager, how did you know each other?"

"It's _Professor_ Xavier," he said.

"Whatever," she said. "That still doesn't answer who you are?"

Logan thought; _who_ was he to me? He was my friend, but it was more than that, but we hadn't dated so he wasn't my boyfriend. To be quite honest, there _was_ not simple answer to what Logan and I had been to each other, we had never labeled our relationship or ourselves and for those who hadn't been there to witness it first hand; it was hard to explain.

"It doesn't matter who I am, I want you out of her room,"

"Well, I'm her sister so I think that I should be able to look around her room if I want,"

Logan bared his teeth in irritation and growled at her. "If you want to know about her, then ask someone,"

"Maybe if you had told me about her earlier tonight when they asked you to then I wouldn't have to be snooping around in here after midnight,"

"Look, I don't feel like talkin' about her, not right now,"

"Then can we talk in the morning?"

"No,"

"Well you said that you didn't want to talk right now, when do you want to talk about it?"

"I don't know,"

"Alright, listen, we got off on the wrong foot earlier, I know that we're both mourning over her death and all that stuff and that this isn't the best circumstances to meet under, but there's no need to be rude to each other. All I want is to know about my little sister,"

"Why do you care about her now?"

"I've always cared about her, she's my family, she was always on my mind during the holidays,"

"During the holidays, that's when you thought about her?" Logan nearly laughed. "I thought about her every day from the time I met her. Where were you when she needed a home, when she didn't have a family and she was scared about having to go back to living in some hell hole of a foster care system?"

"I was at home because I was too young to do anything. Where were you? If it bothered you so much then why didn't you do something about it?"

"I was taking care of her the best that I could. I didn't everything that I could to help her,"

"Oh yeah, you did such a great job taking care of her, they told me that you were with her when she died,"

Up until that point, no one but Logan had blamed him for letting me die and although he had blamed himself enough into believing it, the actual vocalization of someone saying that he was responsible for my death was enough to send him over the edge, raging mad.

"Get out of her now," he growled fiercely enough that she didn't argue back, she only left the room in fear, shutting the door behind her.

Logan hadn't been into my room since the day that I had been killed and realized that right then was not the time to which he would have chosen to go back. He had already cried, that was no longer threatening him, although running from the mansion and never coming back was, however. That thought had plagued him ever since he had first come back to the school, right before Jean had disappeared. It had stayed at the front of his mind, but he would always find a reason to stay; Rogue, Ororo, Jean, his home, his job and then me. But once I was gone, he started to realize that nothing else mattered. Marie was married, so was Jean, Ororo was nothing more than a friend to him and as for his home, well, as far as he was concerned, he could always go back when he felt like it. It would be easy; he could just pack his things and leave. Heck, he didn't even have to pack his things, he could just put on some jeans, grab his jacket and go. He could do it, Chuck would understand, but for some reason the one plan that had been his escape route for so many years wasn't going to work, because he would be trying to run away from me and the memory of me, and he couldn't. Logan had gotten inside of me head and under my skin, but I had gotten far deeper inside of him, more so than anyone else had happened to do. While I had been alive, everything reminded him of me. He had tried to convince himself that it was only because we were friends, because at one point, we were the only two people to care about each other, but he couldn't help but see me in every woman he passed. Yes, he thought about me while I was alive but I haunted his mind once I was dead. No matter where he ran, however far away from Westchester he got, I would always be right there with him.

He moved to walk to my door, he was nearly there, but then he saw the photo on my nightstand. It was of the two of us on the night of the staff Christmas party. He sank down on my bed that I hadn't found enough time to make before leaving for my interview. He grabbed the picture frame and held it up closely to examine it. He ran his thumb down the length of the glass covering my face and arm. He was wrought with anger, livid by the fact that I was gone. He ached with a pain so deep it had soaked though the metal under his skin, settling in his bones so deep that he wondered if it could ever go away.

He cursed, whether it was for him or me or even someone else, he didn't know, it just felt to him like the only appropriate thing to do with his emotions the way that they were. Then he focused and realized he was cursing me. He was cursing me because I was the one person whom he had hurt that badly over, but also as he sat there, looking at my picture, seeing me in my red strapless dress, his love for me was confirmed. He looked at me, thinking of how beautiful he saw me and for one foolish moment, he thought about how he would tell me the next time he saw me. That broke him. That one, single thought was enough to make him resent his mutation. If it hadn't been for his rejuvenating abilities, he would have already stuck a pistol in his mouth, leaving a note behind asking to be buried along beside me. He had picked where I was to be buried, in case, by some freak accident, he were to lose his powers and some how die, he wanted to be beside me. You see, my mother had been buried in Washington, where we used to live just outside of Seattle, but he not only wanted an empty grave beside me; he wanted me close to him. The cemetery in which I was buried wasn't even half an hour away from the school and he liked having the option of being able to speak to me when he wanted. And that was the thought running through his mind right then; he wanted to talk to me.

_I dug you up this morning and took you home.  
To have you here beside me, cold but close, _

_I made my mind up last night that heaven _

_just can't have you. _

I made you breakfast but you would not eat.

_So I took your black dress off and washed you clean. _

The sheets are creased from your last day,

_a silhouette of where you laid. _

_They'll find your headstone in the yard _

_with your black dress and my guitar. _

_I'll carry you back to your grave, _

_where you and I will always stay. _

_I close the casket, it gets dark, _

_they'll find us in each others arms. _

He sat down the picture of us, trying to place it back in the same position that I had had it, and then he saw the drawer to my nightstand was opened slightly. He debated between opening it further to see what I kept in it, or leaving everything as I had. Eventually his curiosity won and he carefully slid the drawer open curiously, not wanted to fling it open in case it was personal things that I hadn't wanted him to see. However, all he found was stationary, ink pens and a journal. Again, he debated whether to take my journal or leave it where it was. He ached to read it, to see the words that I had written about a world that I saw, to look through my eyes and to read my personal views. Had I written about him, had I written anything that might make him feel more at ease with his guilt? What if in the pages of the thick green book with the word 'Journal' sprawled across it in cursive, there held a secret hate for him all along; would that help or hurt how he felt about himself? He didn't know, but once again, his curiosity won out and he picked it up slow and gently. He felt awkward simply just taking it, feeling as though I would come out from somewhere and catch him; opened drawer, hand on my personal journal, yelling at him and telling him that a girl's things were private, not meant to be gone though. But I didn't, so he took it and then stood from my bed to go for my door, but seeing the picture of us once more, decided to take it as well. I didn't need it and he, for some reason, hadn't asked for a copy, so he thought that if he couldn't have me with him, that he could at least sleep a little better knowing that I was right beside him on _his_ nightstand. With my journal and photo in hand, he slinked from my room and turned off the light.

"Night Chloe," he whispered to the empty room before quietly shutting the door behind him.

He walked back to his room, standing just outside his open door, listening for anything odd. All he could hear were the sounds of sleeping students and staff in their rooms around him and so he entered his room and closed his door. He sat the picture frame up on his nightstand, laid my journal down on his bed as he pulled off his A-shirt, and turned on the lamp beside his bed before sitting down. He let out a loud sigh and ran his hand through the back of his hair as he did when he was nervous.

"I can't read this," he muttered to himself, tossing the book onto his nightstand and then cradled his head in his hands as he sat on the end of his bed. He stayed that way for a long time, not wanted to feel anything, not even the movement of his own body. Finally, he lifted his head, looking up at our picture. I was standing to his left, my arm wrapped around his back, my hand on his shoulder and beaming like crazy. He had his arm slung around my shoulder casually, with the hint of a smirk on his face. He shook his head, wondering why he wasn't smiling as big as I was; he thought that I looked gorgeous in that dress.

He looked at the journal once more and saw that it had flipped open to a page when he tossed it down. Logan wasn't really up to date on the rules of woman things, but he was fairly sure that since _he_ hadn't opened the book, it didn't really count as prying. So he picked it up and began to read an entry from October twenty-forth, a week before Halloween.

"Dear Journal,"

Wow, was today busy. I had an interview with a girl in the city at nine this morning, nine! That means that I had to get up extra early in order to get ready. Anyway, so I had an interview with her, but they decided to reschedule. They don't mind telling me this until I'm standing in their _office_! Yeah, I then had to turn around a drive back home. But if that wasn't enough, I broke down like, ten miles from the school. (That stupid truck is a piece of junk and if I didn't love it so much I would take a baseball bat to it). So, I get out to try to fix the truck while trying not to look so suspicious when declining people's help. And, as you know, with my luck I can't just brake down and grease up my lovely outfit, oh no, it has to start raining! I hate New York weather; you remember the good old days when it would just snow? So yeah, I'm standing out in the rain, greasy hand and trying to get enough of a shock to get the thing going when who should come to my rescue but a tall, dark and handsome knight on a white horse? Okay, so it was only Logan in his car, but at that moment, he felt like my hero. I, of course, told him that I was just fine and didn't need any help. He only nodded his head and gave me his leather jacket to put over my soaking wet sweater. I think followed him to Tubbie's where he bought my lunch.

"So, what are you going as tonight?" I asked with a mouth full of food. I was uber cool, he, unfortunately, just hadn't realized it yet.

"What's tonight?" he asked, wiping a bit of mustard from my lip. (I quivered, I hope this doesn't happen every time he touches me from now on; it's a little weird!)

"I was saving that. Anyway, tonight's the school's Halloween party, what are you dressing up as?"

"I'm not,"

"You have to, it's a costume party, keyword being _costume_ there big boy,"

"I don't _dress_ up,"

"You have to; it won't be any fun if you don't,"

"It's not what I would call fun anyway," he said as I stole one of his French fries.

"So you're just going to stand around in normal clothes while everyone else is dressed up?"

"Yeah,"

"You're boring,"

He smirked at me and my heart sped up. I'm not real sure when it started happening, but my pulse now races when he smirks, smiles or winks at me. It's the same as the whole quivering deal; it's all just a little bit too weird for me. I mean he's Logan, _Logan_, why does he make me feel like that, he never used to. When I was younger, I thought he was attractive, I still do, but I don't think I ever had a crush on him. He was always just my friend, the one person who I knew wouldn't be offended by my sarcastic humor, but now it's weird to know him as an adult. He's still my friend but now it's an adult relationship, it's okay to flirt with him and I don't mind when he flirts with me, it's actually nice to have him pay me special attention. But it's still weird; when did he realize that I was actually a girl?

Anyway, the party was pretty fun, even if no one did embarrass themselves. However creative I thought my costume was though; Logan wasn't a fan. When he knocked on my door and let himself in just before the party, he felt the need to tell me.

"You look like an f(explicit)ing hooker,"

"And you would know that first hand, wouldn't you? Oh and don't swear around me," I told him as I slipped on my black Mary-Jane ballet flats.

"I don't pay for it," he said, looking me over.

"I'm not quite sure how we got on the topic of your sex life, but it's something that I really don't want to talk about,"

I bought a top to finish my porcelain doll costume last week when I went shopping. It was a black top with a sweetheart neckline that was, granted, pretty low cut, however, I don't think that I looked like a hooker.

"What's wrong with your hair?" he asked me, eyeing me. He cracks me up when he asks 'what's wrong' with my hair when it looks different.

"There's nothing wrong with it, it's called a 'wig' Logan,"

"I don't like it,"

"Well, it's a costume; I'll take it off after the party,"

I ended up wearing the black wig I bought, even though I had to cut my own bangs in it. I also wore my black skirt, white right and had bought some gorgeous lace gloves at this store outside of the mall the other day. I had a hard time getting the false eyelashes to stay on and even got some of the glue in my eye (don't ask!). I put on circles of blush in bright pink and made little pursed lips out of brighter pink lipstick. It was one of those things where you feel normal and then you catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and get freaked out by the creepy pale girl following you around, it was a little weird, but fun.

After the party, I apparently owed Logan for not only helping me with my truck but for also buying my lunch, so he insisted that I was the hockey game with him.

"This game is completely lost on me," I admitted to him while I sat on the couch beside him.

"I thought you grew up in Canada; shouldn't you know all about it?"

"Well, I'm _not_ Canadian, so it's not of any interest to me to know about it,"

"Then just watch it,"

"But I don't understand it,"

"I'll explain it to you,"

So, he let me snuggle up to him on the couch as he tried to explain hockey to me. I still don't get it, but maybe he'll have enough patients to keep teaching me. Oh yeah, he wouldn't let me lay my head on his shoulder until I took off my wig; he's such a dork.

During the break, he was looking at me real funny when I asked his what it was he said; "Your eyelashes are falling off,"

I reached up, realized that my false eyelashes had come unglued, and were sitting askew on my face.

"They're fake eyelashes," I told him with a laugh before taking them both off. I took off my other makeup earlier and pulled on sweatpants and a T-Shirt, but forgot to take off my wig and eyelashes when Logan told me that the game was about to start.

I'm not sure why he actually likes spending time with me; he doesn't even know I'm cool yet.

Well, it's almost midnight and I'm about to fall asleep; I'm beat! I'll try to write back when I can, but this is goodnight, so goodnight!

Remember to:

Clean room

Wash Clothes

Take back all books to the school library

Make Logan finish teaching me about hockey

Chloe,"

Logan closed my journal, feeling guilty; he had tried to teach me about hockey but I wasn't a quick learner and so he had given up. But he had seen no sigh of my hate him, only the beginning of my falling in love with him.


	3. On The Run

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to X-Men or the lyrics to the song I used in this chapter, which is called 'I Miss You'...how very original. Anway, I hope everyone likes the new third party sort of view this is written in, I wanted something different and I thought it would be cool. I want people to review, even if it's just to tell me that I have typos, I want to hear everyone's opinion so that I can either keep doing it if it's right or change it if it's wrong, I need some help from my lovely readers. Okay, enough with the smarmy stuff, on with the story. Please enjoy!

* * *

The next morning, Logan woke at nearly six. Though he usually didn't wake until around seven thirty or eight, he got up. He was starting to get used to not getting as much sleep as before, since my death had caused him to be more restless than normal.

He got up and was about to get in the shower, when he realized he didn't feel like it. Instead, he pulled on a T-Shirt and buttoned up a flannel shirt over it. Logan realized that he needed to run, not to anywhere, but he just had to run. Xavier's school sat on beautiful property in Westchester, mostly surrounded by tall trees to keep curious passersby from seeing too much. There was a thick forest around the frozen lake near the school and _that's_ where Logan ran. When Jean had been gone he ran there nearly every day for a couple of months, but he slowed down, eventually only going a few times a month. Once they found her, he felt like there wasn't much of a reason to continue them, but he did, it was what he needed to control the animal inside of him; he had to let it get out and run every once in a while.

Logan ran as though his very being depended on it, dodging long branches, jumping over fallen trees, never stopping, always going. He ran and ran, his chest heaving as cold air stung his lungs, letting out his breath and watching it rise into a puff of smoke in front of his face. Logan was in his element when in the woods; surrounded only by natural sounds and scents. Where there was no one that he had to answer to, only other animals, all of which respected his space. He ran long and hard and after an hour, he began to enjoy himself. That's when he stopped. He stood still in the middle of the trees, listening around him as he caught his breath. He didn't know where he was at exactly and was listening for anyone that might have been close by. Sure enough, he heard two female voices, though he couldn't make out whom they belonged to, back behind him. He turned and ran in their general direction; he wasn't trying to find them, just the path that they were walking on. After a few minutes, he finally made his way from the stark white forest out onto the long, winding gravel pathway that started at the school, wound past the lake and around the trees surrounding the mansion.

"Oh!" Ororo said as Logan just missed her as he came running from the woods.

Haylie, whom Storm was walking with to show her the school, was slightly more frightened by the sudden appearance of a wild man.

"Sorry 'Ro," Logan apologized to Storm.

"It's fine," she said with a polite smile, not looking him in the eyes.

"You nearly gave me a heart attack!" Haylie exaggerated.

Logan looked at her and growled roughly. Had Storm not been so fixated on trying to be sympathetic towards him, she would have reprimanded him for trying to, and succeeding in, scaring her.

He didn't stay around; instead, he started the long walk back to the school. He was quite a few feet away when Haylie decided to tell Storm how rude he had been to her the night before, but unfortunately for her, she wasn't aware of Logan's great hearing. So although she was being very quiet, he still heard her asking Storm what his problem was.

"It's a little complicated, but you have to understand that he was the closest person to her, and she to him, from the time they met until the time she died. It's not been nearly a week yet, give him some time, I'm sure he'll come around to you," Storm said, but Logan wasn't so sure; there was just something about her that put him off.

He decided not to go back and tell her that his problem was the simple fact that his girl, his little darlin', was gone and she would never understand how he felt. He just continued his way to the mansion. Once he got there, he noticed just how much everyone avoided him, even the students. A little upset that everyone was running away are the mere sight of him, Logan took the steps two at a time, wanting to just get to his room and shower. He had nearly reached it, making his way through the empty halls, as most everyone was eating breakfast, but stopped dead in his tracks when he saw me standing in the hall, right in front of his door.

"I hope you don't feel as bad as you look," I said to him.

He looked shocked, suspicious and near happy to see me. "How…what are you doin' here, Chloe?"

"I wanted you to come eat breakfast with me,"

He wanted to run to me, grab me and never let me go, but he couldn't move. "What?" was all he could manage to ask.

I smiled at him sweetly. "I have to go," I said.

"Why, where…what are you doin' here?" he asked. I pointed to something behind him and he slowly turned his head to look. When he didn't see anything, he turned back around and I was gone.

He hadn't seen a ghost, what had happened to him was something that was common among people who had lost loved ones; when you want to see someone so badly, some times your mind lets you; projecting an image of them in front of you. Logan knew right away that I hadn't really been there and the realization of how unstable he had become in those days slowly began to sink in. He _didn't_ realize, however, that it was only the beginning.

_Thought I heard your voice yesterday  
When I turned around to say  
That I loved you baby  
I realize, it was juss my mind  
Played tricks on me_

_I miss you  
There's no other way to say it  
And I can't deny it  
I miss you  
It's so easy to see  
I miss you and me_

He forced himself to move and to go to his room, slamming the door behind him. He grabbed a bottle of whiskey and opened it before tipping it back and chugging nearly half of it down. It didn't help. He went into his bathroom and turned on the water in the shower to as how as it would go and let it heat up, filling the room with steam, before stripping down and getting in. During those three days, Logan's schedule had consisted of getting up, eating breakfast, working out, eating lunch, working out, eating dinner, working out and then showering for an hour, maybe two, before going back to bed.

He let the hot water pound against his chest, feeling the burn of it against his skin. It was one of the only times when his powers didn't interfere, as the feeling was a steady pace instead of a one time pain. Logan spent a lot of time in the shower, trying to wash away the blood that I had left and only he saw. He saw it on his chest, his arms, his hands. He saw it on his hands most often while he was eating or working out. He thought that that would be it, though; just seeing my blood dripping from his hands was enough to send a sharp feeling of pain running throughout all of his body. Then he saw me, not just a flash of someone from the corner of his eye that he _thought_ was me, no he had seen, and even spoken to, _me_. He hadn't realized that how he felt when Jean was gone would be different from how he felt when I was gone. He loved Jean, always did, always would, but she had belonged to Scott and he reminded him of it often. I, on the other hand, had always belonged to him alone and knowing that hurt him worse that he had ever known. But he wanted it to hurt, he couldn't allow himself to not hurt and the thought of ever being happy again was just absurd. He had been content while living at the school, he had even enjoyed it, it was his home, but once I was there, he was happy. He felt as though everything he wanted was all in one place. I made him happy; if I was gone how could he ever be happy again?

* * *

Breakfast was, once again, awkward. Not many people spoke while Logan ate, except for Scott, whom everyone assumed was just trying to irritate him. However, they didn't realize that he was actually trying to be helpful. Scott remembered how he felt when Jean was missing and know that the last thing Logan would want was someone being overly polite, not treating him normally and, the one that had bothered him the most, no eye contact…or as much as you could make with him.

"Bobby, can you help me hand up the Valentine's decorations today? The Professor wants them up by the Monday," Scott asked while they were eating.

"Uh…" Bobby said, looking over at Logan. He wondered why Scott would be talking about such trivial things while he was sitting there. "Yeah, I guess,"

"Alright, just meet me in here at around five, I've got a few extra classes today, but I should be done by then," Scott said, tucking into a stack of pancakes. Scott had taken over Logan's self-defense classes at the beginning of that week when he had needed the day off to take me to my interview, the day that I had been shot. Most of the classes had been let out until my funeral, after which they resumed, with Scott continuing to teach for Logan.

"I'll take back over next week," Logan said to him.

Everyone looked from Logan to Scott, waiting to see how he would react.

"I've got next weeks curriculum learned already, why don't I finish it up and then you take back over the week after?" he asked, looking up at Logan.

"I don't need," he started.

"I know you don't _need_ it, what I'm saying is that I've already learned it so I might as well go ahead and teach it to them. It's only five classes," Logan looked at him suspiciously. "Look, I'm not trying to take over your classes, the last thing I need right now is another class to teach, but I've already learned everything for next week so it would be pointless for me to not just go ahead and teach them," he said as Haylie came and sat down beside Rogue.

"Maybe you should have thought about that before,"

"Or maybe you should have told me that you were planning on taking back over before today,"

"Scott," Jean warned.

"Fine," Logan said. "You can teach next week and then I'm takin' back over,"

"Okay, fine," Scott said and then continued to eat his pancakes.

Everyone looked around at one another, trying to figure out what had just happened between Scott in Logan in front of them. For the first time in nearly a week, there was somewhat of a normal conversation at the breakfast table.

Everyone was fairly quiet for a few minutes until Haylie decided to speak. "What sort of things did Chloe do, did she have any sort of hobbies or traditions or anything?"

There was a silence as everyone thought for a moment and watched to see if Logan would answer, but he did.

"Well, she liked to…watch Animal Planet, the History Channel and all of those other boring channels. She would always bring up weird and random facts while we were eating. I do miss that," Rogue said.

"She liked Broadway musicals," Jean said. "She used to come into my classroom singing 'Oh What a Beautiful Morning' from 'Oklahoma' when it would be pouring down rain out and that would always cheer me up,"

"She was a very optimistic person and it rubbed off on other people," said Storm.

"She, uh…she liked the Three Stooges and Abbot and Costello movies. I don't think she had any traditions, though," Scott said.

"She had to watch the movie 'A Christmas Story' before midnight on Christmas Eve and she had to watch the 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas' cartoon every year," Logan said and everyone looked at him, listening very intently. "She was terrible at pool and one of the only people who could beat me at poker. She was always trippin' over things, her own feet, everything, but when she would dance, for some reason she could do that right. She got too involved with her job because she wanted to help all of the kids and she couldn't, which drove her crazy. She had an opinion on everything and always told it to me, whether I wanted to hear it or not. She grew up too fast and died too soon,"

There was a small reverent silence at the mention of my death.

"What do you mean she grew up too fast?" Haylie asked.

"I mean that while you were livin' in a big house, havin' everything handed to you, she was livin' in a bar with people who didn't care about her. She had to start working when she was eight years old. More things happened in that bar than most people ever see and she was there every day and night, watchin' it all,"

"Excuse me, but how do you know that everything has just been handed to me, you don't know me and you don't know about my life," Haylie said offended.

"You're right and I couldn't care less," he said, eyeing her.

"Logan, there's not need for you to be rude, she's our guest," Storm said, finally fighting through her deep sympathy for him enough to reprimand him for his comment.

"I'm not bein' rude 'Ro, I'm just bein' honest," he said, standing.

"I don't know why you're so mad at me, I haven't done anything to you," Haylie said.

"You were in her room, messin' with her stuff,"

"Only because I was trying to find out something about _my_ sister, if you had told me about her I wouldn't have been in there,"

"Well it awfully funny that you've known about Chloe but you don't care about her until she's dead,"

"I told you; I was too young to ever do anything,"

"How old are you now?"

"I'm twenty-six,"

"So you must have been pretty busy these past eight years then, right?"

"You don't know what I do with my time, because I _have_ been busy. I help a lot of people and I would appreciate it if you didn't criticize me and my life. Just because I've had it easier than most people is not a reason for you to just assume that I'm a bad person,"

"I don't think that he meant you were a bad person, I just think that he's curious about why you had never tried to contact her before," Jean said.

"How was I supposed to get in contact with her? We have the same father but I didn't know where he was at,"

"I know, I understand,"

"Well I don't, if you cared so much about her than I think you would have found a way to find her. Why do you care about her now?"

"Logan!" Jean said firmly and grabbed his attention.

"What?" he growled.

"Why don't you go and cool off? If you still want to have this conversation later then you can, but you need to calm down a little bit first,"

Logan gave a growl and walked away. He didn't need to cool down; he needed that stupid girl to go away. He walked down the hall and turned to go up the stairs.

"Logan," Rogue called to him as he placed his foot on the first step.

"I don't wanna' talk right now," he said, continuing to climb the stairway.

"I just wanna' make sure you're alright,"

"I'm fine, just go,"

"Logan, please,"

"I said I'm fine Marie, I don't wanna' talk," he yelled, stopping and looking down at her. She looked heartbroken and slightly scared; he had never yelled at her before. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to yell at you," he said, walking back down the stairs.

"I know, you're havin' a hard time, but I'm just worried about you. I know this is killin' you but I think it would be better if you talked about it,"

He absentmindedly played with one of the white streaks of hair that framed her face. "I can't right now,"

"I'm afraid that if you don't now, you never will, though,"

"You know me Marie; if I need to talk, I'll come find you," he said. "I'll be fine,"

"No you won't, you're not fine, you go off on everyone and work out constantly. I think that you should let Scott teach for you and you should take some time off and go somewhere,"

"I don't need to take anymore time off, I'm gonna' be fine,"

"I need you to be okay Logan, I need you. I'm tryin' to sit back and let you work it out on your own but it hurts me to see you hurtin' like this. The Professor would probably let you go up to Canada, I'm sure,"

But how could he go to Canada without me? He wondered.

"Look, I'm not goin' anywhere, I'm stayin' right here and I'm gonna' be okay," he said before pulling her into a hug. "Don't worry about me kid; I'll be all right,"

But he was lying; he wasn't going to be all right.

Logan went back to his room, debating whether he wanted to go to the gym and workout or not. After the conversation at the breakfast table, he certainly had a lot of frustration to burn through. He thought about it and was even about to change when he saw my journal lying on his nightstand. I had nearly filled it up and so he was curious to see what with, but he still didn't feel right reading it. However, as always with Logan, he had to fight to resist what was in front of him when he wanted it, and he was far too weak to fight. He picked up my journal and opened it randomly to a page, then flipped back to find the beginning of the entry. It was written the Sunday before Thanksgiving.

"Dear Journal,

Hi, it's me again. The Professor called me into his office today and I swear every time he does I'm scared that he's going to fire me or kick me out of the house. I guess he knows I'm nervous because he always just smiles and tell me that it's nothing too serious. Today he called me in because he wants me to speak on Thursday's dinner. Yeah, he wants me to say something that I'm Thankful for this year. Funny thing, nothing comes to mind right away. Ha. I don't know how to sum up these past two months and how grateful I am for it all. I mean, _do_ I try to sum it up? Perhaps I should just pick one thing…but then, what one thing would I pick? I've have a home, a job, Logan. Can I mention Logan or is that just something I need to keep between us? I don't know, but he wants me to write out something nice to say along with the other staff members. You know, for someone who's psychic, he's quite oblivious of my nervousness about speaking in front of large groups. I didn't mention this to him because, A; I'm sure he really knows but also knew that I would say yes anyway and B; It's Chuck, I can't say no to him. He's given me everything that I have, pretty much, and I don't guess it would kill me to stand in front of a few kids and say so. I hope it doesn't kill me anyway, I kind of like being alive right now.

Anyway, as I was coming out of his office, Logan nabbed me and made me play a few games of poker with him…okay, so he didn't _make_ me, but whatever. We started out just going to play one or two and then ended up playing around ten hands. I won seven and now have enough money to buy those black boots I wanted and Scott insisted on referring to as 'hooker boots'. Not that I'm sure the man has ever seen an actual hooker in real life, because if he had, I think he would know that they don't wear those kinds of shoes.

After I beat Logan's bum in poker, I had to get ready for my date with Jason. Logan was not happy about that.

"Where are you goin'?" he asked me, hanging around in my doorway as I was looking for my pair of scissors to cut off the tags on my new jacket.

"I'm meeting someone and then we're going out to eat and to see a movie,"

"What time does the movie start?"

"Seven fifteen, I think,"

"So you'll be home by ten?"

"I don't know,"

"What do you mean you don't know? If the movie's at seven fifteen, it lasts two hours, that gives you forty-five minutes to get home by ten,"

"We might go get something to eat after the movie,"

"But you're eating before,"

"Logan, have you met me, have you seen me eat before?" I said, giving up my search for my scissors. I'm sure that I'll find them one day as they attack me from somewhere I've forgotten that I've placed them and I'll end up being stabbed by them.

"Are you gonna' be home by eleven, then?"

"Look, I don't know, I will be home before midnight though, alright?" I said looking at him. I am such an idiot sometimes. There, standing in my doorway, was a walking Swiss Army Knife, except without the screwdriver and the corkscrew. "Pop a claw, I need one,"

"For what?"

"I can't find my scissors and I need this tag cut off so I can go. I should have been gone five minutes ago,"

"Fine," he said, extending the first claw on his left hand, slicing through the plastic tag with ease.

"Thank you," I said as he retracted it and I slid on my jacket.

"So, are you gonna' sneak in and tell me goodnight when you get home?" he asked with a smirk. My heart slammed against my chest like a bug hitting a windshield, only without all of the gross stuff splattering everywhere.

"In case you haven't noticed, you're not exactly the best person to be sneaking up on, or so I hear anyway," I said and felt quite proud of myself for not just melting right in front of him.

"I wouldn't hurt you," he said.

"As much as I love you Logan, I'd rather not take my chances," I told him and then looked at my watch; it was past five o'clock and I was running later. "I've got to go,"

"Have fun," he said with a slight sarcastic tone.

"Yeah, I'll try," I said and then started to leave but turned back around to him and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "In case I don't see you tonight, there's a goodnight kiss,"

"When did I start gettin' those?" he asked, still smirking, my heart still pounding.

"You only get them when I go away," I said and then managed to give him a wink. "Bye, I'll see you later,"

"Bye darlin',"

Talk about melting; when I hear him call me darlin' I can barely stand, it's like my legs are voice activated to buckle up on me when they hear him say that. It's almost mean, in a nice sort of way.

My date with Jason was okay, the movie wasn't all that great and dinner sucked. We went to some sushi place because I didn't know any better. I nearly gagged when I tasted a piece. How can anyone actually like that stuff; it's raw fish with nasty, sticky rice wrapped up in it.

Anyway, I got home at just after ten o'clock. We had stopped and got some ice cream before I headed back home and once I got there, I was starving, so I went straight to the kitchen, first thing. I walked in and saw Logan standing by the bay window, looking out at the snow, which had just started falling; it was the first of the season. I didn't want to say anything, I didn't want to disturb his peace and he did look so peaceful. I wanted to just stand there and watch him because he looked so beautiful, well…it's because he _is_ beautiful, I guess. I was about to turn around and leave him to think by himself when he turned around and smirked at me. I think my heart might have stopped…or sped up, I'm not sure. Funny how that works, isn't it?

"What are you smirking at?" I managed to say.

"Couldn't wait until tomorrow to see me, huh?"

I rolled my eyes at him. "What did we have for dinner?"

"Some chicken stuff, 'Ro put you a plate in the refrigerator in case you wanted some when you got home,"

"Yes, I love that woman," I said, going to the refrigerator and pulling out a plate. It was spinach and cheese stuffed chicken with noodles and Alfredo sauce.

"I thought you went out to eat?" he asked as I grabbed a bottle of water, a fork and sat down at the island in the middle of the room.

"We went to a sushi place, so I didn't really eat anything,"

"Sushi?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at me.

"Yeah, it was gross,"

"What's wrong with cooked food?" he asked, moving from the window and sitting down at the island across from me. That's one of the great things about Logan; he likes _real_ food, not sushi.

"Did the Professor ask you to speak at the dinner Thursday, too?"

"No,"

"Why not,"

"Because I didn't want to,"

"Ungrateful," I said but smiled. "Why don't you want to do it?"

"I don't like upstagin' Summers," he said with a wink.

"How very nice of you and here I was, thinking that you didn't like him all this time and yet you're letting him have his moment," I said sarcastically.

"So, what are you gonna' say?"

"I haven't a clue; I nearly have a panic attack every time I try to think about it,"

"Why?" he asked and blinked at me patronizingly. He kills me how he does that. He's the only person I've ever met who can do it.

"Because I have a phobia of speaking in front of large groups of people,"

"Since when?" he asked.

"Since I was like, ten. I had to talk in front of my class at school and messed up my whole speech thing; everyone laughed and made fun of me. Ever since then if there's more than like, fifteen people, I start freaking out,"

"Well, some of the kids'll be goin' home for the weekend, so all of them won't be there,"

"Only around seventy-five students are going home, that still leaves a hundred students, or more. Then there's the staff, that's seven, no including me, which is nearly half as many as I want to speak to,"

"You'll be fine,"

"What if I'm not? I mean, what if I throw up on everyone or something?"

"You won't,"

"You have more faith in me than I do," I said.

"You're gonna' be alright, kid,"

I nodded my head slowly. "I will be if you're there," I said. Then he gave me one of those looks that made cold chills run over my skin. He looked as though he wanted to say something to me but couldn't think of the right words, so he didn't, but that was okay with me. Why does he affect me like that?" But I don't suppose that you would miss Thanksgiving dinner, would you?"

Our moment had passed and I had been the one to end it. He looks at me so serious some times; I just get anxious and try to find a way out of him staring at me as intensely as he does, as quickly as possible. Otherwise, I'm afraid that my heart's going to pound from my chest and stop beating.

He smiled at me. More heart pounding. "No, I doubt that'll happen any time soon,"

We stayed up talking and joking around for about an hour and a half before I decided to go to bed. "Goodnight Logan," I said, giving him a kiss on the cheek.

"I thought I only got one of those when you were goin' away?" he asked.

"Well, we'll excuse that rule for tonight," I said before he pulled me to him and kissed my forehead.

"Night darlin'," he said, but kept holding me with his lips pressed to my forehead. "Why don't I walk you to your room, I gotta' go to bed anyways,"

So he walked me to my room and said goodnight to me again then we both went to bed. And speaking of which, it's late and I'm starting to feel bad, I think that I'm getting sick, maybe I'll be okay for dinner on Thursday. If I am sick, I really might throw up on the students and I'm thinking that just wouldn't be a good thing to get all of the teenagers into the holiday mood. That and I'm sure that Logan would taunt me with it for the rest of my life. Anyway, I need sleep so I'm going. I'll try to write back later when I have the time. Goodnight!

Remember To:

Do laundry

Make practice pecan pie for Thursday, just to make sure it doesn't suck now

Write speech for Thanksgiving dinner

Never try sushi _ever _again

Chloe,"

Logan closed my journal and placed it back on his nightstand. He had remembered my speech from Thanksgiving; I had said how thankful I had been for Scott and Logan saving my life and bringing me to the school. If you don't know, there was a six-year gap between the time Logan left me and when I saw him again. The night I had seen him was the last night my boyfriend had given me to get out of the apartment we had shared, because, you see, I had told him that I was a mutant and he was furious. I had gone home by myself and he knocked me in the head, causing me to bleed profusely. Scott and Logan had gone in and saved me and that's what I had decided to speak on. However, as Logan thought back on it, it pained him. I had said that I was thankful for them saving me because I was enjoying life and the opportunities that I had been given so that I could use my life to my advantage. _That_ is what we call 'dramatic irony'.


	4. Held

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything X-Men or the songs used in this chapter, the first of which is 'Gone Away' and the second is 'Held'. If you've not heard the song 'Held' yet I suggest that you look it up, it's beautiful, and so I have to give a big thank you to my sister Tacia for first of all, printing off the lyrics and giving them to me while I was writing theend of thisand second of all, for actually telling me to listen to it. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this chapter, perhaps you might understand now why Logan is being quite so rude with Haylie. On with the story!

* * *

Years of living on the road, going from place to place had taught Logan how to deal with all sorts of people, from rough and tumble men to feisty prostitutes. It didn't, however, teach him how to deal with emotional teenage girls. He had been living at the mansion for over six years and working there for five and yet he still didn't know quite what he was supposed to do when one of the girl students would come to him with a problem. It had been nearly two weeks since my death when Logan was in the gym. He had just gotten done showering when he walked out to find one of his students, a girl named Kirsten, waiting for him.

"Mr. Logan, can I talk to you for a minute?"

He immediately felt nervous; he hated talking to the students outside of class. "Yeah, sure," he said, running his band back through his wet hair. "What do you need?"

"There's this guy and I really, really like him and I think he really likes me, but he doesn't go to school here," she said.

Logan waited to hear what she was going to say next but she seemed to be waiting for his response instead. "Alright, how do you know him, then?"

"Well, I was at the mall with some of the other students and I was hanging out in the coffee shop and we just started talking. We've kind of been dating for a few weeks now and I really, really like him,"

"Yeah, I got that, what do you need to talk about, though?" Logan wasn't really one to go to for dating advice; he knew it but decided not to tell her that.

"Oh, I was wondering if I should tell him,"

He tried to keep his patients but he didn't understand why girls didn't just come out and say what they wanted. "Tell him what?"

"That I'm…well, a mutant. We're supposed to go out for Valentine's Day and I wanted to tell him then, but I like him and I'm scared he'll break up with me,"

"Look, if that guy breaks up with you 'cause you're a mutant, then he doesn't deserve to be going out with you,"

"You're supposed to say that, you're my teacher,"

Yes, Logan had not quite gotten the hang of dealing with teenage girls; they were simply just too moody for him.

"No, I'm sayin' it 'cause it's true. You have to make that decision on your own, though, you have to listen to your instincts,"

"Have you ever not gone out with a girl because you knew something about her?"

"No,"

"So if you love someone it won't matter, right?"

"It doesn't always work like that,"

"Why not?"

"Because some people don't get us, and they won't ever get it. They'll always hate us and we can't change that. But we can't hide what we are from everyone, so if you think this guy is gonna' be worth it, the do what you feel like you need to do,"

"Okay, thank you Mr. Logan," she said. He didn't say anything; he just nodded his head at her. She turned to walk, but only got a couple of feet before she turned back around to face him. "Oh, Mr. Logan?"

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry about Miss Rynolds, I really liked her,"

He drew in a sharp breath. "Yeah, I did too,"

"Well…bye," she said and then left.

The mention of my name didn't hurt quite as badly as it had to begin with, but that only made him feel guilty and _want_ to hurt. He hadn't drank as much in those past few days as he had to begin with, nor had he been working out quite as much. He only went in for a few hours a day to work on the lessons for his classes, which he was supposed to take back over that coming Monday. It was a Saturday and he was giving himself two days to catch back up on everything and prepare some.

He went back to his room to get dressed before dinner, no matter how bad he felt, Logan wouldn't go to dinner in sweatpants and a T-shirt. He pulled open his door and saw my sitting on his bed.

"Hey, can I try your boots on?" I asked.

"No," he replied. He always told me no.

"Why not?" I asked as he walked into his bathroom. As much as he wanted to see me, he wanted me to really be there with him, not for him to just see me randomly.

"Because," he said, pulling off his T-shirt.

"But mine are messed up; they've got blood stains all over them,"

"I'll buy you some new ones," There was a knock on the door and he walked back through his bedroom. I was gone. He opened the door and saw Scott standing there. "What?" he asked.

"Who are you talking to?"

"I was on the phone," he lied. At least he didn't say it was the TV; that's so over used. "What do you want?"

"The Professor wants to see you in his office,"

"Why didn't he tell me himself?"

"I don't know, I was in his office and going to go to my room and he just asked me to come and tell you,"

"Alright, let me grab a shirt," he said and turned around.

"Hey Logan,"

"What?"

"It stops after a while,"

"_What_ does?" Logan asked, taking an A-shirt from his drawer and pulling it on.

"Seeing them,"

"I don't know what you're talkin' about, Scooter," he said as he pulled on the flannel shirt he had hanging up and started to button it.

"When you see them and hear them, it'll stop, then you miss it when it does,"

Logan stared at him hard. "Good, maybe you'll stop seein' 'em, whoever they are," he said, pushing passed him roughly and walking quickly down the hall.

Although Logan knew that if anyone could understand him, it was Scott, but he still didn't want to let anyone know that he was cracking. He had never cared about what other people thought about him, he had never been bothered by other people's opinions of him or what they thought of the life that he had led, but he did care if people thought that he was going crazy, however. Logan was not used to sympathy from people, especially towards him for as long as it had been, but he knew that he would rather people sympathize with him over having them worry that he was losing his mind.

Once Logan arrived to the Professor's office, he wanted to speak to him about his classes.

"Logan, I know that you feel as though you're ready to go back to teaching, but I'm afraid that I don't share the same confidence as you. I believe that you should take a longer break,"

"Look Chuck; I'm gonna' be fine, I don't know why everyone keeps botherin' me about it,"

"Because we're worried about you,"

"Why?"

"Because we all know that you were very close to Chloe,"

"She's dead, this is about me; I don't know why everyone can't just leave her out of this,"

"We were all very close to her as well, but we've gotten through it by talking about her. You on the other hand, attempt to just erase her memory from you by staying in the gym all day long,"

"I teach a class on self defense, I was wokin' on my lessons,"

"That may be your excuse for working out but that is no reasoning for your excessive drinking. I have attempted to overlook your brining alcohol into my school but I'm afraid that I will have to ask you to either drink else where or keep your outbursts down,"

"What outbursts?"

"You have had a quick temper with Scott and Marie over these past couple of weeks, which again, I have attempted to overlook as I believe that they understand that you're mourning, but I will not accept you going off on Miss Robbins that way that you did last week,"

"So that's what this is about? You think that I'm gonna' get drunk and go off on one of the kids? I _can't_ get drunk, it doesn't matter how much I drink, it doesn't help. Maybe if you feel that way you should just fire me then, maybe I won't cause so much trouble for you that way,"

"Logan I am not firing you, I just need you to learn how to control your temper. I don't believe for a minute that you would do anything to harm any of the children. However, I do ask you to at least try to understand that you're not the only person in this house that is mourning Chloe's death; we are _all_ trying to deal with it,"

"It's not the same for you,"

"Granted we were never quite as close to her as you, I believe we are all pained by her absence from the house,"

"I see her; I can hear her talkin' to me and then when I try to sleep all I dream about is her. She's everywhere I look and every one of those girls that passes me in the hall. I see her blood still on me. When I close my eyes, I see her dying, lying there terrified and telling me that she was scared. I have to live with the regret of promising her that I would find her father when all I want to do is watch him die they way that I had to watch her. Every day I have to live with the fact that I was in love with her and for some stupid reason, I didn't do anything about it. I'm not sure how you felt about her Chuck, but I know I'm doin' a pretty good job getting' through right now," he said, his voice rising with passion over the conversation.

"I am well aware of the repercussions of you being present at the time of her death,"

"It has nothing to do with me bein' there, it has to do with I was supposed to protect her and I couldn't. She trusted me; do you know how hard that was for her? Men did her wrong her whole life and when she finally trusted me and started carin' about me, I let her down and hurt her and then I let her get killed,"

"Logan, you did not _let_ her get killed. What happened was not your fault and I know that Chloe did not blame you for anything that happened to her,"

"Chuck if you don't let me teach," he said and the paused, trying both to think of the right words to say and also to keep his emotions in check. Logan had never been good at expressing how he felt in words; it was always with actions. He didn't like you, he would show you and you would feel it. He was angry, everyone could tell. He loved you, you felt like the center of the universe and as though no one had ever been loved the way that he loved you. But right then, he knew that he had to try to relay his feelings to the Professor; there was no way around it. "These past two weeks that Summers has taken over for me, all I've done is stayed in my room or in the gym, if you want me to stop doin' that then you're gonna' have to let me teach. Without those kids, I'm gonna' go crazy,"

Professor Xavier didn't have to be psychic to know that it was true; all he had to do was look at him and it was evident. On the outside, he looked fine, as though he were holding up well, but one look in his eyes and you knew it was all just a faced. He was cracking and breaking and falling apart, it was all right there, but no one would ever know it because during that time, the Professor and Scott had been the only ones to truly look him in the eyes.

"It will get easier Logan, I promise, but you have to let it. You cannot justify what her father did to her by punishing yourself. Naturally, you feel guilty because you were there, but you didn't know that anything was wrong or going to happen,"

"But I should have been watchin' her, that's what I was supposed to be doin',"

"And I should have contacted you in another way. If I had done so, then you wouldn't have been away from her and you would have known to protect her," he said and Logan realized that he wasn't the only one with guilt.

"I can't get over this; I can't ever forget it,"

"No one is asking you to,"

There was a long stretch of silence and they both sat quietly, each full of thoughts and memories of me. The Professor had been what I had been looking for: an actual father figure. He was smart, generous, lovely and at times, quite witty. He had given me the life that I had never had and had always strived to make for myself. He had been a good friend and I had appreciated everything that he had given me. Because he had been one of the very few that had known what I had been through, he tried to make sure that I never had to worry about anything ever again, and I never did.

"I was in love with her Chuck, how do I get over _that_?"

"You don't. As with everything, it will get better over time, but there is no guarantee that you will ever truly get over her,"

"I only wanted to take care of her,"

"You did," he said. "And she was grateful for it all,"

Logan ran his hands back through his hair as he slumped in his seat. "Did she know…how I feel?"

"Yes, I believe so and I also believe that she shared the same admiration for you that you had for her. There was no doubt that she enjoyed your company and I believe that she felt closer to you than anyone else,"

"So do I get to keep my job or what?"

Professor Xavier smiled at him and nodded his head. "Yes, you may resume teaching on Monday,"

"Alright," Logan said standing. "Thanks for this nice little chat, Chuck, but I got somewhere I gotta' go,"

"You're welcome Logan, and please, be very careful,"

"I will," he said, leaving his office.

Logan wanted to talk to me; he needed to. After his conversation with Xavier, he felt an overwhelming urge to speak _to_ me rather than _about_ me, so he went to his room to get dressed. When he started down his hall, he saw Haylie walking towards him.

"Hey, I was looking for you," she said to him, stopping in front of his door so that he couldn't ignore her.

"Why?"

"Tomorrow is Valentine's Day and I'm taking you out,"

"Excuse me?" he asked, blinking at her condescendingly.

"I know that we haven't gotten along all that well, but I'm going to make it up to you because _I _am taking _you_ out for dinner,"

"I'm busy,"

"Doing what?"

"None of your business,"

"If this is because you don't think that you can afford it, don't worry; I'm paying for it,"

Logan suppressed a growl. The Professor wouldn't let him teach for sure if he went off on her right then. "I have my own money, if I wanted to go somewhere, but I'm not interested,"

"You're not interested in going anywhere or in me?" she asked, winding a piece of hair around her index finger and pouting her lips slightly.

He thought she was attractive, beautiful actually, and had only just noticed as she was standing there, blatantly flirting with him. He hadn't noticed because, well…because quite frankly, I had been the only woman on his mind, but he couldn't ignore how gorgeous he thought she was, not with her standing right there in front of him.

She was attracted to him as well; she had been since she had first seen him that day in Professor Xavier's office, standing in his workout clothes, dripping sweat. She thought he was sexy and the growling didn't bother her anyone, as a matter of a fact, she thought it only made him sexier.

"I'm not interested in either one," he said.

"Are you sure about that?" she asked, biting her bottom lip. You know, I used to do that but I never did it to try to look appealing. It was a bad habit and I only did it when I was thinking or nervous. She, on the other hand, was only trying to woo the beast in front of her.

"Yeah, I'm sure. Now, if you don't mind, can you get out of my way?" he said strongly. Good boy.

She stepped away from his door and allowed him to enter. He grabbed his boots and say down on his bed to pull them on. Haylie followed him into his room and stood beside him, crossing her arms.

"This can't all be because I was in her room; you must have something else wrong with you,"

He looked up at her. "There's a lot of things wrong with me, but this ain't about me, it's about you,"

"_Me_, there's nothing wrong with _me_,"

He laughed at her. "I'm sure there's not," he said sarcastically. "So why don't you just leave fore I accidentally insult you again?"

She rolled her eyes and looked over to her left where she saw the photo of Logan and me that he had taken from my room. She reached over and picked it up. "Is this Chloe?"

"Don't touch that," he said, pulling on his second boot.

"She was actually a little pretty with makeup on. I saw those other pictures of her without it and she looked rough,"

"She didn't need makeup, she was fine the way she was,"

"Well, she certainly doesn't look like me,"

"Which is a good thing," he said, stand and snatching the frame from her grasp, placing it back onto his nightstand.

"You that that _she_ looked fine without makeup?" She asked, raising an eyebrow in disbelief.

"Look," he said, standing closer to her in an attempt to intimidate her enough so that she would leave him alone. "I don't care what you say about me but you won't talk about her that way. She was beautiful and you're right; you don't look anything like her,"

"_That's_ why you were so close to her," she stated.

"What are you talkin' about?"

"The two of you were going out, weren't you?"

"No,"

"Really, because I think that you're lying,"

"I don't care what you think, I wasn't good enough for her, she deserved someone better,"

"I doubt that," she muttered.

"Get out of my room,"

"What?" she asked, looking shocked.

"I said get out,"

"I don't think you really want me to leave," she said again, biting her bottom lip.

"I'm not gonna' stand her and play your stupid little kid games with you, so why don't you go and find someone else who will?"

"I'm not playing stupid games and I think you would enjoy play with me," she said then leaned in a kissed him. She kissed him softly at first, then harder, but he was reciprocating any of it and finally moved her from him as gently as he could manage, given his current state.

"When you insult my girl and I tell you to get out I don't mean for you to kiss me, so I'm gonna' tell you one more time and if you don't leave then I'll make you. Get out of my room and leave me and her alone,"

"Fine," she said, walking to his door. "But you don't have to worry about me leaving her alone; she's dead." She smirked. She knew that it would cause a reaction from him, which was what she wanted, but he knew that and took in a few deep breaths to keep himself calm and just waited for her to leave, which she finally did.

He didn't wait for the sound of the door closing before he grabbed his blue jean jacket, pulled it on and then grabbed his leather jacket to slip on but saw the nearly faded blood stain that I had left on it. Storm had cleaned it for him and had gotten about ninety percent of the blood washed out, but the small spot that she hadn't been able to get out and hoped that he wouldn't notice, had just stood out to him clearly. He had gotten better, he really had, but it was things like that that griped his heart and tightened the knot in his stomach. He knew that I was gone and was slowly beginning to accept it, but hearing Haylie's tactless comments and having to see my blood on his clothes made him want even more for it to all be wrong and just a big misunderstanding.

Logan wasn't a religious man, he was mad at whoever he thought controlled everything because he had had his memory, his life, his everything, taken from him and he didn't know why. However, he prayed, not to anyone specific, just to anyone who would listen to him. He prayed that I would be okay, that I would be taken care of, that whoever had a say in the matter would allow me to know that he loved me. Men would like for us to think that they're all macho, he-men who can do it all and always remain tough. That they can go through anything without so much as flinching, but they know that they can only conquer that feat with the person they love right beside them, the women in their lives. Without us, however, there is a tremendous and quite drastic, difference. Without me, Logan pardoned and asked for forgiveness for any, and all grievances that he had towards anyone whom he thought might be taking car of me. Because, you see, Logan was an extremely proud man, but he would never let even something like his own pride get in the way of my well-being. Even after I was dead, Logan still wanted to take care of me and so he did what he could, even if that meant letting go of grudges that he had held for years, during a time when that was all that he had. Yes, men are stubborn creatures: always wanting their way in arguments, always trying to get the last word in, doing their best to explain to you how their taste in food, movies and music is somehow better than yours and sometimes, even making you watch hockey when we really couldn't care less about the sport, but they redeem themselves. The things that Logan had done, but had never bothered him, he finally repented for, just so that he could ask for my safety and there is no way to put into words how deeply grateful I was for that.

* * *

The cematary was fairly empty when Logan arrived, with only a few people scattered around, engrossed only in the stone in front of them. He walked to my grave, seeing my tombstone for the first time. He dusted the snow off with his bare hand and the placed a rose in front of it. The red a bright contrast to the stark while snow all around him.

"Hey darlin', I wanted to bring you something for Valentine's. I know I'm a day early, but I thought I'd bring it anyway," he said, taking a deep breath and running his hand back through his hair. "Look, I'm still not used to this whole thing. I hate comin' here 'cause you shouldn't be here, you should be at home with me. And I shouldn't have to bring you flowers down here either, 'cause I should be takin' you out tomorrow, that's what I want to be doin'. You're drivin' me crazy kid, you always have, but these past two weeks have been…a little harder on me," he paused for a second and kicked around some of the snow on the frozen ground. "I talked to Chuck today and uh…he said that you knew how I feel about you. I'm sorry darlin', I really am, I was stupid not to do anything about it. I would do anything to make you happy, but when you told me what you wanted, I couldn't do it. I was…scared that I was gonna' hurt you and if I hurt you then that would have killed me. But I didn't realize that I _did _hurt you 'cause you just wanted the same thing as me. All I want right now is to hold you, just to touch you once, that's all I want and that's never gonna' happen. I should have kissed you ever time I had the chance, done everything that I could to show you how much I loved you, but I didn't. I thought I was gonna' get to keep you this time, but he took you away from my twice. Chloe, if I hadn't promised you that I wouldn't find your father, I would have already found him and killed him. Why did you make me promise you that? I could have made him suffer the same way that you did. I know that it wouldn't have brought you back, nothing's gonna' bring you back to me, but if I could have watched him die then it might have made this a little easier on me…but you wouldn't let me," A breeze blew by and he looked around him. There was a redheaded woman getting into a black car and he thought how odd it was that while Jean was gone, every redhead he saw made him turn his head, but since I had died, it was curly blondes that caught his attention. He watched the car drive away until he could no longer see it. He let out another long breath. "I've gotta' go, but I'll come back again sometime soon, I promise. I love you and miss you, kid…bye,"

_Maybe in another life  
I could find you there  
Pulled away before your time  
I can't deal it's so unfair. _

And it feels  
And it feels like  
Heaven's so far away  
And it feels  
Yeah it feels like  
The world has grown cold  
Now that you've gone away.

Leaving flowers on your grave  
Show that I still care  
But black roses and hail Mary's  
Can't bring back what's taken from me  
I reach to the sky  
And call out your name  
And if I could trade  
I would.

And it feels  
And it feels like  
Heaven's so far away  
And it stings  
Yeah it stings now  
The world is so cold  
Now that you've gone away.

Logan left the cemetery, feeling slightly drained. He hadn't been there to speak to me since I had been buried and seeing my gravestone hurt him more than he expected. There was something chilling about actually seeing my named etched onto the tombstone that made the pain that had first settled deep into his bones as he watched me dying, return with a fierce vengeance, attacking him once more. But he didn't deserve it, he had worked so hard those past few years to make a good life for himself, to help the kids at the school and he had earned the good things in his life, but I was hurting him. I was dead and yet some how I still managed to hurt him.

* * *

Valentine's Day at the mansion was usually filled with love struck teenagers trying to woo his or her crush. With the adults, it was usually just spent with their partners, and more than likely ended with them watching a romantic movie. That year, however, 'the holiday of love' had been scaled down quite a bit do in part by my death.

Although Logan had never cared too much about any holiday, Valentine's had always been his best, usually giving presents to all of his girls, which involved Jean, Storm and, of course, Rogue. He had bought their presents weeks before, but that morning, as he went to take them from his dresser, he saw the extra one that he had bought for me. Even though we hadn't been speaking all that much at the time when he had bought them, he wanted to still buy me one. They were silver bracelets with a charm of the letter 'X' on each. He took them out and let out a deep breath. How had it all gone so terribly wrong? At what point was it fair to take me away from him? He had done some bad things, he knew that, but he felt that taking me away was the wrong punishment. Although it had certainly punished him well enough, it was nearly killing him, but he thought that it wasn't right that I should have lost my life because of what he had done in his past. Logan wasn't one to judge fairness, he knew that things weren't 'fair' and he had never expected them to be. However, when it came to me, to his family, he was protective and felt the need to take care of all of them at all times. And so when something happened to one of us and not to him, he felt it was wrong and strongly unjustified. Therefore, blaming himself.

_Who told us we'd be rescued?  
What has changed and why should we be saved from nightmares?  
We're asking why this happens  
To us who have died to live?  
It's unfair. _

This is what it means to be held.  
How it feels when the sacred is torn from your life  
And you survive.  
This is what it is to be loved.  
And to know that the promise was  
When everything fell we'd be held.

Logan left for breakfast a little earlier than usual. He slipped into Jean, Storm and Rogue's classrooms each to place their presents on their desks, as he had every year. He never said that it was he who left them, but they all knew. After putting their Valentine's gifts in their places, he walked into the dinning room. He quickly scanned over the staff table and saw that the only empty seats were beside Haylie and Scott. He had to decide which one he hated most.

"Mornin' Scooter," he said, plopping down in the seat beside Scott.

"Good morning Logan, as much as I would love to spend the day with you, is there anyway that my wife can sit beside me?" he joked with a smile.

Logan realized that Jean wasn't at the table and so giving up his seat would mean having to sit beside Haylie.

"Yeah, sure," he said slightly irritated, but standing and moving anyway.

"Happy Valentine's Day Logan," she said but he didn't reply, he only grabbed a plate, stabbed a pile of pancakes and pulled them onto it. "Do you have any plans for tonight?"

Everyone looked at her in disbelief. They all noticed how she seemed to enjoy watching Logan's response to her invasive questions, especially when the involved me.

"Well, I was gonna' take Chloe out," he answered very smoothly; as though I had simply just had something I had to do and couldn't go, rather than being dead.

"Well, I'm not doing anything, why don't I go with you instead?"

No one had been talking, they were all quiet respectfully at the mention of my name but it seemed as if everyone had stopped breathing even, just waiting to hear Logan's answer.

Haylie thought that by asking him in front of the other staff, he wouldn't turn her down, obviously she hadn't know Logan for very long or she would have realized that turning her down in front of the other teachers was the least of his problems at the moment.

"No, I think I'd rather go to the cemetery," he said as he took a bit of his pancake. Scott let out a small laugh and Jean, who had walked in just in time to hear the conversation, nudged him with her elbow.

It wasn't a full on insult, he hadn't actually said; 'I'd rather hang out and talk to a dead Chloe than go out with a live you,' but one could imply that that was how he meant it. However, he would defend to the Professor, if he were to call him on it later, that he simply meant that he would just rather spend his day with me than going out and attempting to have fun.

"Logan, I need to speak to you for a moment," Jean said standing.

"Don't I get to finish eating first?" he asked.

"You can eat when we get done; it'll still be there when we get back,"

"Fine," he said as he stood and then followed Dr. Grey as she led him from the dinning room, down the hall further and into her classroom. "Can we make this fast, I need to work on my lessons for this week,"

"Logan listen; I know that you don't like Haylie because she's Chloe's sister, but just try to be nice to her, she's not going to be here for much longer,"

"Me not likin' her doesn't have anything to do with her bein' Chloe's sister,"

"Yes is does,"

"No, I don't like her because since she's been here all she's gone is disrespect Chloe,"

"I'm sorry that you feel that way, but I know that this is deeper than that. You're mad because since she was fifteen you have been there for her as the only family she had, but once Haylie showed up, you were jealous,"

"I am _not_ jealous of her," Logan said.

"Yes you are, you think that since she has a real family member around now that you'll be pushed into the background,"

"The background of what Jean? Chloe's dead, there's no reason for me to be jealous of anyone,"

Jean stopped and looked at him hard for a moment. "She kissed you?" he didn't say anything. "Why would she do that?"

"I don't know,"

"What did you do?"

"I made her leave," he said. "Why is she still here, she doesn't care anything about knowin' Chloe,"

"The Professor feels that she should stay for just a little bit longer,"

"Why?"

"I think that the Professor would prefer that I _didn't_ tell you,"

"Well I don't care what Chuck would prefer, if she's stayin' here I deserve to know why,"

"The Professor thinks that since her father doesn't know that she's a mutant then we might be able to use her to help catch him,"

"Well that's the most useful thing she's done since she's been here," he said with a slight sarcastic tone. "So why has it taken so long for this to work, why haven't you tried anything yet?"

"She doesn't exactly know that she's going to help us. The Professor thinks that it would be better not to tell her right away,"

"Why can't Chuck just use Cerebro and find him?"

"He has, he's been following him the past two weeks,"

"So where is he?"

"He's in Canada,"

"Why doesn't he just call the police and tell them, why do we have to wait around for her to keep up with the plans?"

"Because he's out of the country,"

"Well how long do we have to wait for her to do something?"

"The Professor wants to give her another week or two," Logan let out an irritated sigh. "You can help speed I up,"

"How?" he asked, looking right at her, but she adverted her gaze. "Jean, look at me," he demanded. He was tired of no one looking at him, with the exception of Scott, Xavier and Haylie, who we wished _wouldn't_ look at him.

She looked up at him. "I'm so sorry for you Logan," she said.

"I know but what can I do to help speed up this whole thing; all I want is to put this guy back in jail for her, that's what she wanted," he said. "Tell me what to do, Jean,"


	5. Deception and Lies

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything X-Men or Marvel or to the lyrics of the songs I used which are 'Who You'd Be Today' and 'Broken' which is the story's namesake, but I thought that bit of the lyrics fit in this bit of the story, so they're a little early. Please, keep your arms and legs inside at all times and enjoy the next chapter!

* * *

To what degree is it okay to deceive someone? Is it okay to put yourself into a position to possibly hurt someone if the end effect could somehow help to bring the big picture all together? Is it okay to make someone believe in something untrue when you know that it's a lie but you know that it's all for a very good purpose? What if what you were doing even hurt you, could you do it? Could you make everyone you know believe it? There's a quote that says; 'What the eyes see and the ears hear, the mind believes'. This theory was soon put to the test inside Charles Xavier's mansion. The other things being tested; Logan's acting abilities and the lengths that he would go to, to make my dying wish of my father being put back into jail for my murder come to fruition.

Logan didn't have to do anything beneath him, like actually apologize to someone. No, Jean had taken care of that for him, and for some _odd_ reason, even though Haylie had been turned down for a date over a corpse, she felt the sudden urge to go and talk to Logan once again. I was quite secure with my powers, but being a telepath much be _so_ much fun; you can make people do whatever you want them to.

Haylie walked into the empty gym, save for Logan, who was fiercely and maliciously attacking the punching bag until it threatened to swing off the base.

"I thought you might be in here," she said.

"What do you want?" he asked, reaching out and stopping the bag.

"I thought you might have reconsidered my invitation to go out with me tonight?"

"Look, I take woman out, not the other way around,"

"Alright then, would you like to extend an invitation for me to go out with you?"

He took a deep breath and let out a long sigh, making his naked chest heave and Haylie to stare without discretion. "Have you ever been to Tubbies?"

* * *

Haylie Robbins had never been to a restaurant where no one knew who she was and didn't wait on her hand and foot. So, one can only imagine how she might react to a small, mom and pop hamburger stand with only ten or so tables in the whole place and not many items on the menu that weren't deep-fried. And so one might also consider the fact that when she asked Logan what to order, she wouldn't know _not_ to listen to his suggestion of hot wings. Once she did, she whined far more than I had when I had tasted one of Logan's. 'Hot' does not even begin to describe those things, it felt as if someone had lit a match and put it under my tongue.

"Why in the world would you ever recommend that anyone actually order these things, are you trying to kill me?"

He smiled at her coyly. Granted, he hadn't suggested them to her just to watch her in pain, but he did find it quite amusing.

"I don't have a problem with 'em,"

"No, they shouldn't sell these things without a warning, that's completely wrong,"

"That's why they're called 'hot' wings, they're hot,"

"Those are so much worth than hot, though, my mouth is _still_ burning,"

"You'll get over it,"

There was a small bit of silence as they ate. "I knew you'd change your mind," she said.

"About what?"

"Going out with me,"

He didn't say anything; he just nodded his head.

* * *

"Logan, can we talk for a minute?" Rogue asked as he and Haylie walked through the door.

"Yeah," he said, walking off from Haylie to follow her as she went down the hall. She led him into the kitchen and closed the door.

"What are you doin' with her?" she asked in a hushed voice.

"Nothing,"

"I thought you told her this mornin' that you would rather go to the cemetery than go out with her?"

"Listen Marie," he started.

"No, you listen to me Logan; I've heard her say some bad things about Chloe, she thinks she's better than her or something. I know that we didn't get along with each other but I never said anything bad about her,"

"I know kid, it's just gonna' be till she leaves,"

"Well if you keep hangin' out with her then she's not gonna' leave,"

"I'm doin' this for Chloe, so just give me some time, Marie,"

"How is hangin' out with her doin' something for Chloe? She obviously doesn't care about her,"

"And you did?" he retorted angrily.

"Well we weren't best friends or anything Logan, but I didn't say things about her and I was at least decent with her. She acts like she's better than all of us because her step-daddy gives her money. I didn't expect you would fall for her just because she's Chloe's sister,"

He swore. "Marie, would you just stop? I know what she's said about her and I know how she acts, but I have to ignore that for right now,"

"Why, why purpose does it serve? You're not just bein' nice to her, you took her out…on Valentine's Day!"

He grabbed her shoulder and pushed her away from the door. "Alright, listen to me, Marie," he said, moving his face in close with hers. She had become used to his sudden emotion states and no longer became alarmed when he would move and push her or when his voice would take a sudden angry tone. "I am doin' this so that I can talk her into meeting her father. When she does he can be put back into prison,"

"That's all it is?"

"Yeah, that's it,"

"Alright, but don't get carried away with it,"

"I'm not goin' to,"

"Are you sure, 'cause she's pretty,"

He looked away, over to the window and he saw me. I was curled up on the windowsill looking out at the snow. He shook his head and looked back at Rogue. He let out a long breath. "Yeah, I'm sure; she's not what I want,"

"No matter what you do, it's not gonna' bring her back,"

"I know…I know, but this is just something that I gotta' do for her,"

"Okay, if you need my help just ask me, alright?"

"I will,"

"Do you promise?"

"Yeah, I promise, Marie,"

* * *

Logan lay in bed, not able to go back to sleep. He had had another one of his dreams, but instead of me blaming him for my death, I yelled at him for taking Haylie out. The day had been a hard one for him; he had hoped to take me out on Valentine's Day, nothing romantic, just so the two of us could be together. What would we have done? he wondered. That thought seemed to stay at the forefront of his mind; what would I have done or said next? You see, I had a habit of telling Logan everything that was on my mind, whether it was serious or not. He was deeply pained by the thought of missing something that I had to say. It also hurt him to think about not being able to make me smile or laugh again. It was nights like those that forced him to remember how much he loved to make me smile. He prided himself on being able to do so, and could barely make it through a day without seeing me smile at least once. Those kinds of nights made him feel guilty for the time between New Years Eve and the day before my death that we barely spoke. If you don't know why we weren't speaking, it was because on New Years I kissed him and told him how I felt about him. Logan being Logan and not wanting to hurt me decided that even though he felt the same as me, we should just keep our relationship the same as it had bee. I felt like an idiot, why had I told him how I felt; I was so sure that it wouldn't work. However, no matter how sure I was it wouldn't work or that he didn't like me, the pain of actually hearing him say it felt worse than any I had ever felt.

_Sunny days seem to hurt the most  
Wear the pain like a heavy coat  
I feel you everywhere I go.  
See your smile, I see your face  
I hear you laughing in the rain  
Still can't believe you're gone. _

It ain't fair you died too young  
Like a story that had just begun  
But death tore the pages all away.  
God knows how I miss you  
All the hell that I've been through  
Just knowing, no one could take your place.  
Sometimes I wonder, who you'd be today.

He wasn't going to be able to sleep, he knew it, so he sat up in bed, turning to stand up, but then he saw my journal. He decided to stay in his room and read instead and so he flipped on the lamp beside his bed and grabbed the journal from where it lay on his nightstand. He opened the book somewhere near the back and found the entry page. It was from two days after Christmas and only four days before my kissing incident with him.

"Dear Journal,"

Today was fantastic; I had so much fun. It started at breakfast. Since we're still on winter break, everyone got to sleep in and so we didn't eat until nearly ten o'clock. It felt good to sleep in and just be lazy. During breakfast, the Professor announced that as soon as school lets back in, I can have my job back. I am so excited! I've missed working so badly.

After breakfast, I decided to go for a walk outside. It was beautiful, the snow was falling really heavy and I was just too excited about everything to stay indoors. I get my job back and in only four days, Logan and I are going to see 'Wicked' together. So I got all dressed up and took a walk around the lake. It's frozen solid and looks absolutely gorgeous down there. I wonder if I could skate on it? I'll have to ask the Professor about that before it thaws out. Anyway, I was walking back towards the school and I saw Logan standing outside smoking a cigar. For some reason, I had the urge to hit him with a snowball. So I did. I'm not usually that stupid but there was just something about him that made me think that I could actually throw one at him, laugh and then just walk away. Well, you know, studies now show that being in love with someone can actually cause the part of your brain that connects actions with consequence to shrink, or something, making you more likely to do stupid things. Hence the reason I suddenly found myself hurling a softball size snowball to the back of his head. It wasn't until he turned around looking totally pissed off that I realized just _how_ bad of an idea that was. But when he saw me and realized that I had been the one who threw it, his anger disappeared and he was suddenly smiling at me wickedly. I attempted to walk away, but turning my back on his was a bad idea. So, I started walking, happy with the fact that for once, I had been able to sneak up on him. I only get a few feet away when I felt a snowball pelt me in the back of my head. I turned around just in time to see Logan running towards me and the next thing I know, I was laying flat on my back in the freezing snow with him on top of me.

"Now, why would you hit _me _with a snowball?"

"I was just playing around; it was only meant to be a joke!" I defended.

"So you thought it was funny?" he asked, smirking down at me. I was out in the freezing cold but my cheeks felt like they were on fire because I was blushing.

"Uh…no?" said sheepishly.

He pushed the hair in my eyes away with his hand and my breath caught in my throat. He is so insanely beautiful and it still surprised me when he's so gentle. "Are you sure about that, darlin'?"

Darlin' + Me Quiver

"Well, it was a little funny; you should have seen how mad you looked, _that_ was hilarious!"

"You're not really in much of a position to be laughin' at me, now are you?" he said and continued smirking at me.

The movies always make it seem so romantic when people lie in the snow together, and to some degree, it was. I was smiling like a total lunatic and blushing like a complete dork because he was on top of me, smirking and making my breathing stop by continuing to brush the hair from my face. However, what wasn't romantic was the fact that he was a two hundred or so pound man with an extra one hundred pounds of metal inside of him, lying there. Granted he was propping most of his weight on his elbows, it was still a little awkward. Also, the snow was starting to soak through my clothes, making me wet and cold.

I thought about kissing him, because isn't that what you're _supposed_ to do in a position like that? But I chickened out and decided not to. I'm such a wimp, but he really didn't look as though he were too eager to kiss me, either.

Anyway, we lay there for a while and I know, I know, I _know_ that he was taking his time because he knew that it was making me blushed and embarrassed, why else would he do it? I know that he knows that I have a crush on him, I don't know, however, if he knows that I love him the way that I do. I really have to either get over it or tell him about it; it's getting far too much for me. I want to tell him, I really do, but what if he doesn't feel the same as me? That could be slightly devastating. Okay, so perhaps more than _slightly_. Logan's everything to me, if I told him that I was in love with him and he said that he just wanted to be friends, it might make things awkward. I can't let something get between us like that; nothing ever has before.

"Logan,"

"Yeah?"

"You are _so_ going to pay for this,"

"You're the one who started it, just remember that,"

"I only threw a snowball at you,"

"And I threw one at you, so we're even,"

"No, you not only threw a snowball at me, but you also tackled me to the ground where I am lying in the freezing snow,"

"So what are you gonna' do to make me pay you back?" he asked, his smirk still plastered across his face.

"Well, if I told you then it wouldn't be quite as effective, would it? You'll have to wait and see, because it's going to be a surprise,"

"I don't like surprises darlin',"

"Too bad, you should have thought of that before you decided to knock down a helpless little girl who innocently threw a small, _teeny-tiny_ snowball at you, and you are a big, strong, he-man. But whatever, I mean if _you_ think that's justified then I suppose there's nothing I can do to convince you otherwise,"

"Well, I might be able to make it up to you,"

"And how might you do that?"

"Let me take you out for lunch?"

"You think that taking me out for lunch is going to pay me back for crushing my pancreas and giving me hypothermia?"

"I'll take you to Tubbies,"

"I can be ready in ten minutes,"

He smiled at me and shook his head, then stood up. He moves with such grace, it makes me sick. I mean, _I'm_ a woman, _I'm_ supposed to move with grace a beautiful, but instead I trip over everything that I can. _So_ not fair. So anyway, after he stood up he gave me his hand and helped me up. I love his hands; they're so sexy…is that weird? I just think that they're man-gorgeous in the fact that they look as though they belong to a real man, you know? It's like even his powers couldn't stop the constant damage being done to them, so they have a slight worn in feel to them. Anyway, not only did he help me up but he also helped dust the snow off of me. I think he has either split personalities or Bi-Polar disorder, because seriously, who attack a girl and knocks them into the snow but then helps them up and to brush off said snow? I am completely in love with him. Sigh. Wait…I'm in love with a crazy man…it could be worse I guess, at least he ridiculously attractive and he's nice to me for the most part.

It took less than ten minutes for me to get ready to go to Tubbies. On the way over, Logan made fun of me for using the heater in his car to dry my hair. Apparently, he's never had to resort to suck things. When I lived with Tom and Viv up in Canada, I remember that when the power would go out, I would have to dry my hair in their car on the way to school. So that brought back quite a few memories for me.

"I'm sorry," he said while we were eating.

"For what?"

"If I hurt you out in the snow earlier,"

I smiled at him and blushed slightly. "No, I'm fine, don't worry about it,"

"Are you sure?" he asked and I felt totally guilty for complaining earlier.

"You know me well enough to know that if I was hurt even in the _smallest_ bit that I would be whining about it right now, and as far as I can tell, I'm not really whining at the moment,"

He flashed me a smirk. "You do whine an awful lot,"

"You know what, I was being nice to you, I could have lied and said that you actually _did_ hurt me but no, I was trying to make you feel better. Then you turn around and make fun of me. I really just don't appreciate that, Logan,"

"Well I think that as long as I still have to go to that stupid show with you,"

"Excuse me, _have_ to go? I told you that I could take someone else but you said no. Who's whining now?" I said, cutting him off.

He only smiled at me.

I still can't believe that _he_ actually bought me tickets to a Broadway musical, that's just priceless.

Once we got back to the mansion, Logan and I played a few games of poker. I beat him eight out of twelve and he had to let me try on his cowboy boots. I am now dead set on getting a pair of my own. They were a little bit big on me, but I am so in love with them. You know that it's sad when I start drawing my fashion influence from a self-defense teaching ex-cage fighter.

"You know Logan, I wouldn't mind if you just gave me these boots, they look better on me anyway," I said to him. I had to close the lid on his toilet and stand up on it to see what they looked like in his mirror.

"No, now take them off,"

"Nope, this is my prize for beating you in poker,"

He crossed his arms over his chest and leaned up against the doorframe that led into his bathroom. "You didn't _beat_ me,"

"I won more games than you did and so yes Mr. Logan, I beat you like a drum,"

He was quiet for a minute, watching me as I tried very carefully to turn as far as I could without falling. I thought that once I realized that I like Logan, really like him, that his watching me would make me feel weird, but it doesn't. No matter how I feel about him, he's still just Logan, always watching out for me.

"Why do you want those things anyway?"

"I don't know, I just like them, I think they look cute,"

"Cute?" he asked with a raised eyebrow. (I love it when he does that)

"Well, you look hot in them, instead of cute,"

"Not lookin' too bad yourself, darlin'," he said to me, walking over and helping me down once he realized what I was trying to do. I may have blushed some, but by now, I'm so used to it, I can barely tell anymore. "Maybe if you're good I might buy you a pair,"

"And what does me being good consist of?" I asked, sitting down and pulling off the boots, handing them back to him.

"No more beating me at poker,"

"Well hey, if I _keep_ beating you, I can get enough money to buy them on my own," I said, walking back into his bedroom and slipping my house shoes back on. "And then perhaps I could start wearing flannel and redneck belt buckles,"

"Hey, don't knock flannel and don't make fun of my belt buckle, either,"

"I'm neither knocking nor making fun of either. I only said that perhaps I should start wearing them if I'm going to steal your boots, too,"

"You'd make it look a heck of a lot sexier than I do," he said and I _know_ that I blushed that time.

"Oh, because you have a real problem with that, don't you, woman are just completely turned off by how you dress," I said sarcastically, sitting down on his bed and shuffling the desk of cards. "Want to play me again?"

"Why, do you want my car now?"

"Tempting, but no, I was actually thinking we could just play for the fun of it,"

"No,"

"Why not?"

"Because I wanna' win something,"

"How about the pride of a job well done?" I said sheepishly.

"No," he said again. "How about if you win I buy you a pair of boots,"

"And if you win?"

"You have to…go and shoot pool with me tomorrow night,"

"I _suck_ at pool, though,"

"That's the point,"

"So what, you win and I have to go play pool so that you can try to beat me again and take my money from me?"

"Well, I don't think I'll have to try to beat you at pool, so I'm not gonna' take your money,"

"How very kind of you," I said, rolling my eyes at him. I sighed. "Alright, deal, but when I beat you, you had better pay up; I'll want my boots before I start work back,"

"Alright darlin', deal the cards,"

Alas, Logan won six out of ten games. Six! He barely won. Not that I actually mind that he won because even thought I have to wait to get my boots, I'm going to play pool with him tomorrow night. I'm excited. Yeah, so we played poker until it was time for dinner and then we went and ate with everyone. It was relatively uneventful, but afterwards the staff all decided to watch a movie together. The only one that the guys and girls all agreed on was 'Casablanca'. Rogue decided that she didn't like the movie after about thirty minutes so she and Bobby went to bed. Which is quite a shame; I don't know how anyone could _not_ love that movie. Whatever, to each their own I guess. Anyway, the Professor was the only one who played along with me while I was quoting the movie. Come to find out, the man does one mean Humphrey Bogart impression. Once the movie ended, we all shuffled off to bed, where I'm at now.

Well, I'm tired and sleepy so I must go now, but I just had to write before going to sleep so that I wouldn't forget anything. Today was great and I'm looking forward to playing pool tomorrow night. Granted I'm terrible at it, but perhaps I can learn a little bit more and hey, I get to hang out with Logan, what's more fun than that? Okay, there are probably some things more fun, but I'm too sleepy to think of any.

Alright, I'm about to fall asleep writing this, goodnight!

Remember To:

Clean Room

Pick up new student files from Chuck's office

Get copy of the photo Logan and I had made at the Christmas party from Dr. Grey

Think of a way to get Logan to fall in love with me so I won't have to worry about rejection when I tell him how I feel

Chloe,"

Logan closed the journal and gently placed it back onto his nightstand. He remembered that day, especially when we had been out in the snow. He had wanted to kiss me too. Not because he had seen all of the romantic movies that I had and thought that that was what you were supposed to do, but because he had thought that I had looked so beautiful. My cheeks and lips were that pink-purple color they turn when you're out in the cold. My hair had fallen all around me, circling my head like a golden halo. My pale skin had blended with the white or the snow and I was smiling up at him. He remembered that he had been so diligent about brushing the hair from my face because he had wanted an excuse for touching my face, for touching me. He had loved me back then as well, but, like me, had not acted on any of his feelings. Partly because he _was_ afraid that I would start to see him as he saw himself, and partly because he was afraid to hurt me. But mostly Logan didn't tell me how he felt because he was scared. Scared that I like Jean, would turn him down and that he would have to continue living knowing that I didn't love him the way that he had me. He was also scared because Logan lived by the same rule of thumb that I had; when good things happen to you, something bad _has_ to happen, or something's not right. Logan was scared that if he told me that he loved me and we ended up together that something bad would happen to me, because I would make him _too _happy, things would be _too_ good for him and so he chose to, for once since he could remember; forgo doing what he wanted. If only he had realized that something bad was going to happen to me no matter what he did, perhaps we could have made our time together all the more special. Yes, had Logan known that I would be taken away from him; he would have kissed me that day and every day after it. He would have told me how beautiful he thought that I was, how smart, how talented, how absolutely radiant he saw me. He had wanted to tell me, and even tried a few times with mixed successes, but you see, Logan couldn't tell me all he thought of me. It had nothing to do with not wanting to show me how he felt about me; it had to do with the simple fact that every time he tried, he couldn't find the right words. Sure, he thought that I was beautiful, but he hardly said it because he was always searching for a _better_ word. He wanted for me to fully understand just how he felt and yet there were not words quite as descriptive as the feelings he had for me. There was no way for him to tell me how gorgeous and full of life my smile had been, or the feeling he got when looking into my eyes. Logan had never been one to share his feelings with people, unless they were that of a disgruntled nature, but for me, he would have told it all to me, had only he found the words worth praising me. What he didn't understand, though, was that I latched onto every word he said that just to hear him speak was enough for me. The times that he had told me what he thought of me, I was high for days. Not because I felt as though I was suddenly better than everyone else or that I even agreed with him completely, but because Logan was the single most influential person in my life. I loved him with everything that I had in me and with every kind of love you can have. When you think so highly of someone as I had with Logan, to hear them say that you're beautiful, smart and worth everything good that you have, it leaves a deep impression on your mind and heart. I don't know if he knew it or not, but Logan owned my heart, he had since I was young and no matter where I am, it will always belong to him.

_I wanted you to know I love the way you laugh  
I wanna hold you high and steal your pain away.  
I keep your photograph and I know it serves me well  
I wanna hold you high and steal your pain. _

'Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome  
And I don't feel right when you're gone away.

You've gone away, you don't feel me, anymore

_'Cause I'm broken when I'm open  
And I don't feel like I am strong enough.  
'Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome  
And I don't feel right when you're gone away_

_You've gone away.  
You don't feel me here anymore._


	6. Losing You

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Marvel, because seriously, if I did, I would be rich out the wa-zoo and I'm totally not. I also don't own the rights to the song in this chapter which is called 'Losing You'. Now, I looked up pretty much all of the lyrics after I finished writing the story to find some that related to it and I was surprised by the line in this song where it says 'I remember the time when you asked me what was right or wrong' (or something like that) because in 'Unbreakable' Chloe asks Logan what's right and wrong on the ride to Seattle. Just thought that ya'll might find it as interesting as me. Anywho, on with the chapter, please enjoy!

* * *

"Well, this is the last place I expected to find you," Haylie said, walking up to Logan where he was sitting in the library the next day.

"Why?"

"You just don't look like the book type,"

He blinked at her condescendingly. "Well, I know _how_ to read," he said, trying not to be too rude to her.

"Oh, I know that," she said, sitting down beside him. "Anyway, I was looking for you,"

"So why are you in here?"

"Because you're here,"

"I thought you didn't expect to see me here?"

"I already looked everywhere else,"

He ruffled the back of his hair with his hand. "So why were you looking for me?" he asked.

She ran her fingers over his other hand, massaging the spots between his knuckles. If only she know what lay just under the skin; there razor sharp blades made from indestructible metal. Perhaps then, she wouldn't have been looking at him so seductively.

"I wanted to ask you something," she said, turning her head to the side and biting the edge of her lip slightly.

He moved in his seat uncomfortably; he didn't want her touching him. "What?"

"I was wondering…did Chloe keep a journal or a diary or anything?"

He thought it was none of her business, but decided not to say so. "Not that she told me about. Why?"

"Well, it's just that everyone's feeding me all of these sugar coated stories about her and I was just wanting to know the _real_ her. There's _no_ way that she was that great of a person,"

He felt as if a knife had been stabbed into his heart and twisted; he thought that I _was_ a great person, and better than her at least. He let out an aggravated sigh. "Chloe was…honest, about everything. How she acted around everyone was how she felt, so if everyone's tellin' you stories about her, then they're true,"

"So she never got mad or anything?"

He thought back and a small smile spread across his lips. "She got mad at me,"

"For what?" she asked, continuing to stroke his hand.

"Uh, when we first met I fought in the bar she lived in and she ran bets on the fighters, but apparently I screwed them up, so she got mad at me about it. She didn't like me back then and she let me know it,"

"So that was it; you only fought when you first met?"

"No," he said. He was no longer looking at her, but was lost in thoughts of me. "We would fight almost everyday about something, but I never got mad at her,"

"Then why did you fight?" she asked, moving from his hand, up his arm.

"'Cause that's just how we were,"

"But everyone said that the two of you were close, why would you fight with each other if you really were?" she asked, massaging his shoulder. "It doesn't seem to me that she cared as much about you as you did,"

He looked at her and moved her hand from his shoulder. "Probably not," he said and she looked satisfied with herself. "I don't think anyone could care about me like I care about her,"

"_Care_ about her, she's dead," she said with a rude chortle.

"Do you _want_ something from me?" he asked, forgetting his plan momentarily as his voice took on a slightly angry tone.

"I want you to forget about her. It's stupid for you to sit around talking and thinking about her when there's someone else here that's interested in you,"

He took a sharp breath as she touched his cheek. "I can't,"

"Why not,"

"Because,"

"Because why?"

He looked her right in the eye. "Because while your father is still out there getting away with murdering her, that's all I can think about,"

"That's not fair to me," she said.

"Yeah, well, it ain't fair to her either,"

She pulled her hand away from his face, relieving his tension. She thought for a long while. "What if…I've never met him, so he doesn't know that I'm a…mutant," she spat, as though she resented the word, but more so the meaning behind it.

"So?" he asked, trying not to sound pleased with himself, but instead disinterested in what she was saying.

"So, if he doesn't know what I am, maybe I could meet with him,"

"What does that have to do with anything?" he asked as she began stroking his hand again, obviously feeling as though she was coming up with an original plan to get him to be hers.

"Well, since I'm his daughter he shouldn't have any suspicions about me wanting to meet him. That way you can set something up, some way for the police to come and find him. Once they do, he'll go to jail,"

He ran his free hand back through his hair. "What's in it for you?"

"You said that you can't get over her knowing that he's still out there, if he's gone then you won't have to worry about anything," she smiled. Bingo.

He nodded his head. "Alright, fine. Talk to the Professor and see if he can help you out,"

She picked up his hand and kissed his knuckles. "I'll take care of it all, don't worry about anything,"

"I won't," he said and she kept smiling at him slyly. "I have to go,"

"Where?"

"I've got to practice for my classes tomorrow,"

"Right now?"

"Yeah,"

"Will you be at dinner?" she asked as he stood.

"I don't know,"

"Why don't you know?"

"I've got long classes tomorrow,"

"Can I come watch you practice then?"

"I don't like people watchin' me what I'm workin' out," he said, walking towards the door.

The liar; he didn't have a modest bone in his body and loved it when the woman would watch him work out and whisper about him when they thought he couldn't hear them.

"Not even Chloe?"

He stopped. "No, I didn't mind her," he said and then left without so much as casting her a single look before walking out of the room and into the hall. He turned the corner and nearly ran into Scott. "Scooter," he said, acknowledging him.

"Logan,"

Logan stopped and turned around to see Scott walking away. "Hey Summers, you seen Marie anywhere?"

"Yeah, she's in the kitchen,"

"Alright," he said and then made his way into the kitchen. Sure enough, there was Rogue standing by the island licking chocolate from her finger after sneaking a bite of the icing that was meant to go on the cake for desert that night.

"Caught'cha kid," he said and she turned around, looking surprised.

"I wanted somethin' sweet and I couldn't wait till tonight; are you gonna' tell on me?" she asked with a teasing smile.

"Well, I just might," he said, walking towards her.

"What do I have to do so you won't tell?"

He paused for a moment. "I want you to touch me,"

"What?" she asked, the smile wiping from her face. "Why?"

"Because I need to feel something,"

"No,"

"You said that you would help me if I needed it,"

"That's not gonna' help you, Logan,"

"All I want is for you to touch me, go upstairs, drink a bottle of whiskey and go to bed,"

"No, I'm not gonna' do that,"

"Why?" he asked, slightly agitated by her denials of his one request of her.

"Because if I do that and you get drunk, you might so something stupid,"

"Like what?"

"Like put that pistol in your closet to some use," she said and he looked at her slightly surprised. "You didn't know I knew about that, did you?"

"I'm not gonna' use it on anything, Marie,"

"I'm not talkin' about anything; I'm talkin' about _you_,"

"Listen, all I want is-"

"To get drunk? Why, what's that gonna' do? You'll pass out and when you wake up sober it's still gonna' feel the same,"

"That's the thing kid, I _can't_ feel anything,"

"Then why do you need to get drunk, what's there to drink away if you don't feel anything?" she asked, looking him in the eye. "I'm sorry that you lost Chloe, we all are, and you know that I would do anything to help you feel better, but I know this isn't gonna' help you,"

"Look, if I don't do something then I can't keep goin' through with this thing with Haylie,"

"Then don't, let Jean or Storm or the Professor or even Scott deal with it,"

"I'm not backin' outta' this now,"

"Why? You're not well enough yet to be doin' something like this,"

"I'm not _sick_ Marie, that's not my problem,"

"Then what is, why can't you let someone else do this for you?"

"Because she's listening to me and if Chuck can get this worked out, she can meet with this guy and he can be sent right back to jail in a couple of weeks,"

She looked at him surprised. "You've already talked her into?"

"I didn't talk her into, it was all her idea," he said with a small smirk.

She gave him half a smile. "You are good, aren't you?"

His smirk expanded. "I'm the best there is at what I do,"

"I have no doubt about that,"

"So are you gonna' help me or not?"

"Not like that, no. I need you here with me Logan, I just need _you_ and I can't do anything that might take you away from me,"

"I've told you Marie; I'm not goin' anywhere, I'm not gonna' leave you," he said and she looked away from him. He tilted her face back up to look at her, the touch not long enough to help or harm him.

"I've heard you say that a few times before," she said. "But you would still leave,"

He swore. "You were a kid back then, you've got Bobby now,"

"Bobby's not the same as you, I need you both,"

"There's nowhere I wanna' go,"

"There's nowhere you wanna' go or you're out of places to run?"

"Look, I'm sorry, but I'm not gonna' leave you now, you're all I got, kid,"

She looked at him with the same look she had when she was only seventeen and he had told her that he would take care of her. He_ had_ taken care of her and so she repeated the same question that she had then, nearly seven years before. "Do you promise?"

He pushed the white streak of hair that had escaped her ponytail away from her face. "Yeah, I promise," he said and then pulled her to him, careful not to touch her bare skin; if she didn't want him to touch her than he was going to respect that decision. No matter how badly he wanted to chug down a bottle of Jack and actually feel its effects on him, he loved Rogue far too much to go against what she said.

"I wanna' help you and if you want me to do anything else, I will,"

He kissed the top of her head. "I know,"

"I love you Logan,"

"You too, kid,"

_I lost the count now of how many letters,  
I've wrote from here.  
And I lost the count now of how many days,  
I've been away from home.  
I remember the time that you asked me,  
What was right or wrong  
And I don't care,  
What I'm missing is you.  
You  
Can't get over losing you_

* * *

Professor Xavier's school for the gifted is not unlike other schools in the fact that rumors can start and spread like wildfire. On occasion, the rumors stretch out beyond the students and lead to the staff. Certain cases in point would be the time when everyone thought that Jean and Scott were getting a divorce or when it was being told that Storm was pregnant. They were usually few and far between and when they did come up, the Professor would put a stop to them. When I died, the talk was about me, most often about the relationship between Logan and me. However, it took only three weeks after my death for a new subject to emerge from somewhere inside the school's walls. With the new rumor, there was a lot more damage being done that with any of the others.

Logan was at the staff table eating breakfast, sitting beside Rogue as usual when Bobby came in and tapped him on the shoulder. He looked up at him. "Mornin' Bobby," he said, taking a bite of his bacon.

"I need to talk to you Logan,"

"Can it wait until after breakfast?"

"No,"

"Alright Drake, let's go talk then," he said standing. They both walked into the hall together and stopped in an empty corridor. "What do we need to talk about?"

"Marie," he said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"What about her?"

"I know that the two of you are close, you have been since before she and I ever got involved and I've never cared because you're her friend, but I'm asking you right now and I want you to be honest with me; exactly how close are you and her?"

"What are you gettin' at?" Logan asked, mimicking Bobby's arm motion and crossing his own over his chest.

"Are you having an affair with Marie?"

"Excuse me?"

"I'm not playing around with you Logan, are you and Rogue having an affair?"

"No," he said with an angry tone.

"You're telling me the truth?"

"Why don't you talk to your wife about this?"

"Are you telling me the truth?" Bobby shouted, the sound of his voice bouncing back angrily off the surrounding walls.

Logan walked up to him, eliminating the space between them. He placed a hand on his shoulder with a firm grip and looked him square in the eye. "Listen to me Bobby, Marie is my girl, I love her but I haven't, and never will, make a move on her, that's not how I see her. I don't know where you got that idea but you better get rid of it real quick kid, 'cause nothing's goin' on between us, you got that?"

"Someone said that they heard the two of you saying that you loved each other and that they say you kissing her,"

"Did this person fail to remember that no one can touch Marie, how would I be kissin' her?"

"You sure found a way on New Years Eve," he spat.

"She was tryin' to piss Chloe off that night; it had nothing to do with us,"

"So you're saying that this person is lying?"

"Well considerin' that it never happened, yeah, I guess I'm sayin' that they're lyin',"

"Why would someone lie about that?"

"I don't know,"

"So there's no truth to it at all?" Bobby asked, looking Logan back straight in the eye, no longer scared of him like he used to be when he was younger.

"No," he said, letting go of his shoulder and moving back a few feet. "On second though, don't mention this to Marie, there's no point in upsettin' her over some stupid rumor you heard,"

"I think _I'll_ decide what to discuss with _my_ wife,"

He nodded his head at him. "Your call kid," he told him and then walked away, going back to the dining room and sitting down in his seat beside Rogue. It wasn't much longer before Bobby followed and sat down on the other side of Marie, acting as though nothing were wrong.

The rest of breakfast was tense, just not for Logan. Everyone could see that there was something goin on between him and Bobby, and only the Professor and Jean _knew_ what was wrong, but it didn't faze him. He was used to people assuming things of him, especially after the years he spent chasing Jean, much to Scott's dismay. It didn't bother him that Bobby thought of him that way, but he was furious that he would ever think that _Marie_, of all people, would actually cheat on him. Couldn't he see how crazy she was about him, was he really _that_ blind that he couldn't see that she would never do that to him? The longer he sat there thinking about it, the angrier he became. He thought Bobby was a pretty smart kid, why in the world would he be so quick to believe some stupid rumor. And where exactly did he hear it? Who would do that to his Marie? He was determined to find out who it was and put a stop to it; there was no way he was going to let anyone talk badly about his girl.

* * *

Logan was in his classroom, straightening up for his next class, when he felt a pair of hands cover his eyes.

"Guess who," Haylie said from behind him. He moved her hands from his eyes and turned around to face her. "No fair, you cheated,"

"I've got to get this room ready for my next class,"

"But I want to play with you,"

"I can't right now, I've got to work," he said, trying to continue putting the room back in order.

"Well, can we do something tonight?"

"I don't know,"

"Why not,"

"'Cause I don't know what I'm doin' tonight,"

"You know, we've gone out like, once, and that was a week ago,"

"It's also been a week since you said you were gonna' take care of this thing with your father and as far as I know, you haven't done anything about it yet,"

"Maybe you were spending so much time with Rogue, you didn't notice,"

He stopped dead and turned around to see her smirking at him triumphantly. "Excuse me?"

She let out a small laugh. "I've only been here for three weeks and I see what's going on between you. Everyone else much just be stupid or blind," He stalked over to her and grabbed her by her arm. "Ouch, that hurts, let go!"

"So you're the one who told Drake that me and Marie were havin' and affair?"

"I thought that he should know what his wife was doing,"

"She's not doin' anything,"

"Really, because I heard the two of you saying that you loved each other and then you kissed her,"

"And how did I do that, I can't _touch_ Marie!"

"I'm sure that her being married wouldn't stop you from that,"

"No, I mean _no one_ can touch her,"

"What are you talking about?"

"No one can touch her skin, so obviously you didn't see what you thought you did,"

She tried to wring her arm from his grip, but he was holding on too strongly. "Well, I heard you both tell each other 'I love you', I _know_ I heard that,"

"I'm sure you did,"

"So you don't deny that?"

"No, I don't, but that don't mean that me and Marie are havin' and affair. I've told you that you can think or say what you want about me, but you're bringin' her in on this and I'm not gonna' let you do that,"

"You protect Chloe and Rogue when people talk about them but I bet you don't take up for me when they say things about me, do you? And you're not going out with them,"

She thought they were going out. No wonder she had put him off when they met; she was apparently more delusional than he was, and he saw and heard a dead girl.

This was a pivotal moment for him; did he keep his promise to me or did he take care of his Marie? She was, after all, still alive. But he also had to decide whether she was playing him like a piano or if she really _was_ as thick as she was coming across. One look into her eyes and he went with the latter.

"Look, me and Marie have known each other since she was seventeen and I feel the same way about her now as I did then, but if you want anything from me, then you're gonna' have to stop talkin' about her,"

"Alright, fine," she said and he let go of her arm and she crossed them over her chest.

"And I want you to apologize to Marie and Bobby,"

"No," she said with all the defiance of a two year old not wanting to get dressed.

"We're not goin' anywhere until you do, so it's up to you,"

She stamped her foot and pouted slightly. Either Logan had nerves as strong as his claws or he really, _really_ loved me, because I would have never been able to put up with her childish antics. "Okay, I'll tell them I'm sorry,"

"Good, you can do it at dinner tonight, that way everyone can hear it,"

"No, I'm definitely not doing it in front of everyone, I'll just tell them afterwards,"

"No, I think you'll apologize in front of everyone, 'cause it seems your little story had all of the kids talkin'," he said. His first three classes that morning involved dodging questions about the rumor. Most of which had come from the boys, all nudging each other and giving him winks of approval. He responded by making them run two laps around the house.

"But there's like, two hundred people at dinner,"

"Yeah well, something tells me that you don't have a problem with talkin' in front of crowds," he said. "I've gotta' get ready for my next class, so unless you wanna' help I suggest you go and figure out what you're gonna' say; you only got a few more hours,"


	7. Ghost of You

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything X-Men, or Marvel for that matter, but I would thank them not to sue me; it's not as if I'm actually making anything from all of this, and besides, don't worry, the offical stuff is probably better than mine anyway. Oh,I don't own the rights to the lyrics of this chapter's song, either, which is called 'Ghost Of You'. Alright, on with the chapter, please enjoy!

* * *

Dinner was interesting, at best. Bobby was mad at Logan, who was waiting for Haylie to apologize to Bobby and Rogue, which the Professor was waiting to referee afterwards. Jean was preparing to calm Logan down after her speech, Rogue was mad at Bobby for being ill with her all day, which was why she had Storm sit between them, and Scott was happily oblivious to all that was happening around him as he sat eating his steak and mashed potatoes.

"Uh, Mr. Xavier, may I say something to everyone, please?" Haylie asked in between dinner and desert.

"Yes you may," he said with a polite smile and braced himself for what she was about to say.

She stood, then everyone went quiet and she smiled at herself. I'm sure she thought that she alone commanded the attention of the room. Little did she know that the Professor had sent everyone a mental message to 'please give their attention' to her.

"Hi, I'm Haylie," she said and Rogue rolled her eyes at Storm, who managed to stifle a laugh and give her a stern look instead. "Last week I misunderstood something that happened between two of the staff members here and in a bit of an emotional state, I let it slip to another person and over the past week it's sort of gotten out of hand. So I would like to apologize to Bobby and Rogue Drake for the rumor that's been started about their marriage. I had no intentions to make anyone believe that Rogue was having an affair with my boyfriend Logan,"

Bobby and Rogue stared open mouthed as Logan shook his head and Scott choked on his water.

"_Boyfriend_?" he whispered to Logan from behind Jean's back. He only glared back at him and bared his teeth, giving him a warning with a low growl.

"And so I just wanted to apologize to the Drakes, Logan and the rest of the staff and students that may have been affected by this. I'm sorry," she said and then sat down.

Logan stood and left the table, went into the hall and started up the stairs.

"Logan, are you mad at me, I apologized to them, that's what you wanted me to do, isn't it?" Haylie asked, following him out into the hall.

He turned around at the top of the stairway and ran both hands back through his hair. "No, I'm not mad," he lied.

"So are we still going out tonight, then?" she asked. Was she desperate or what?

He let out a long sigh. "Yeah, we can leave in about an hour, alright?"

"Yeah, okay," she said, staring off at him, wondering if he was going to come back down.

"I'm gonna' go to my room for a while, I'll come get you when I'm done,"

She nodded and smiled weakly. "Yeah…alright, I'll be ready…and waiting for you,"

He didn't say anything in response; he just turned around and continued down the hall and to his room. He closed the door behind him and when he turned, he saw me standing by the door that led out to the balcony that connected to his room. I turned and smiled at him.

"So, you and Haylie are hitting it off pretty well, huh?" I asked.

"Only for you, darlin',"

"Where are you going to take her, you've already been to Tubbies together, are you going to show her how to shoot pool now, too?"

"No,"

"Well why not?"

"'Cause I don't want to,"

I walked closer to him and looked over at his nightstand where I saw my journal. "You know Logan, you never struck me as the type to keep a diary, goes to show my judge of character, ay?"

"It's yours," he said, looking away from me and scratching the back of his head.

"I know; I'm dead, not dumb. Find anything interesting in there?" I asked, walking even closer.

"No,"

"No? Does my life not interest you?" I asked teasingly as I kept walking, closing the gap between us.

He made a sound in the back of his throat and looked at me nervous and confused; it was the longest conversation he had had with me yet. "No, I do, but, uh…"

"You know Logan, I don't think I've ever seen you like this; you're usually so _witty_," I said, stopping right in front of him, folding my arms over my chest.

"I miss you, kid; I want you here with me,"

"But I am,"

"No…no," he said, shaking his head. "I want you. I wanna' hold you, I wanna' touch you, I wanna'," he paused as tears rimed his eyes. "I wanna' be able to feel _you_," I stepped up to him and placed a hand on his cheek. He looked up and closed his eyes, fighting back tears. He could feel my hand, but it was distant and icy cold against his skin, not warm, as it had once been. "Why did you leave me?" he asked, looking back at me, his eyes full of pain and his face taught with anger. He ground his back teeth down, keeping his jaw steady and his nostrils flared as he tried to keep the tears in his red streaked eyes from falling.

"I didn't leave you, I'm right here and I'm with you where ever you go. You won't always see me, but I'm there. I'll be in the snowflake, or the raindrop, or the wind that blows by you. I'll be in everything that makes you smile or laugh, and I promise you one day that you'll be happy again. Don't _ever_ think that I don't want you to be happy, I don't care what happened to me, I want you to keep living, because as long as you do, I know that I will. You took care of me, you did a good job and we had a long run, but it's time for you to rest, you have to Logan, promise me that you will?"

He looked at me, into my eyes and a tear escaped his eye, rolling down his cheek as he looked up, taking a shaky breath. "I promise," he said, looking back at me.

"Good," I said shaking me head and moving my hand from his face. "I have to go now,"

"No, stay here with me, please," he said.

"Logan, why do you ask, you know that I can't," I said, backing away from him slowly.

"No, you can, just for a little while Chloe, just stay right here with me,"

I moved back a few more feet and smiled with enough sadness of my own to haunt him for a few more nights. "I told you, I didn't leave, I just have to go for now," I said, reaching the door to his balcony and opening it. I back up out onto it and the lightly falling snow fell down around me. "I love you Logan, you do know that, don't you?"

He swallowed hard and took a slow, shaking breath. He ran his hand over his mouth and rested it at his neck. "Yeah darlin', I know it, I love you, too," he said and then watched as I disappeared into a wind carrying snow, which blew the door closed that I had left open.

I was gone, I had left him once again and it hurt him worse and worse each time I did. He was torn slightly; he enjoyed seeing and speaking to me even though I was dead. It was a morbid comfort for him. However, he hated not being able to control seeing me when he wanted and the pain he felt when I would go away each time, rivaled that which he felt those first few days after my death, and _that_ made him want to stop seeing me.

There was a knock on his door and he turned right around to answer it. He opened the door and saw Scott standing in the hall in front of him.

"What do you want, Scooter?" he asked.

"I just wanted to see if you were okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Well, I heard…"

"You heard what?" he growled.

"I heard you talking….to Chloe,"

"So?"

"I know we don't get along that well Logan," Scott said and Logan let out a grunted laugh. "But if you ever want to talk about it with me then you know you can, I understand what you're going through right now,"

"Do you?" he asked with a slight condescending tone.

"Logan, when I lost Jean it nearly killed me, there was nothing I could do to get her off my mind and I nearly went crazy without her,"

"I can't go anywhere in this school without seein' her, she's everywhere I go. I can't turn a corner without rememberin' the last time I saw her there," he said, his voice slightly rising with anger as he spoke.

"I know, it takes a long time to get over it, it hurts,"

Logan looked at him. "You didn't have to watch Jean die in your arms while you had to sit there not able to do anything to make her feel better. I had to watch her, lying there, scared about dying and I could do anything to stop her from bein' terrified. Jean knew she could die and chose to do it anyway, Chloe didn't ask to be killed, someone took her life when she didn't deserve it. You got your girl back Summers, I'm not gonna' get mine," he said and then shut the door in his face.

_Get the feeling that you're never  
All alone and I remember now  
At the top of my lungs in my arms she dies  
She dies _

At the end of the world  
Or the last thing I see  
You are  
Never coming home  
Never coming home  
Could I? Should I?  
And all the things that you never ever told me  
And all the smiles that are ever gonna haunt me  
Never coming home  
Never coming home  
Could I? Should I?  
And all the wounds that are ever gonna scar me  
For all the ghosts that are never gonna catch me

Things just weren't going well for Logan; I was gone and the reality of that was sinking in deeply, he was having to keep up an act with Haylie so that she would follow the plan that he had somehow let Jean talk him into. Then there had been the whole ordeal of the rumor that he and Rogue were having and affair and so the last thing that he needed was Scott going all Dr. Phil on him and trying to get him to 'share his feelings'. What he needed was a bottle of whiskey, a hot shower and to sleep it all off for a couple of hours. Unfortunately, he didn't have the luxury, however; he had to take Haylie out in less than an hour and so he did the next best thing to losing himself in a bottle of alcohol; getting lost in my journal. He walked over to his bed, sat down and picked up the book before flipping towards the back and opening it to an entry from January seventeenth.

"Dear Journal,

Today was dreary and dismal, once again. It's still odd for me to grasp how big of a part of my life Logan was. Without him, it like my life had stopped or been put on pause. I miss him _so_ much, but I guess it's good for me to be spending more time with everyone else. I mean, Jean, Storm and I have gotten a lot closer over the past two or so weeks, it's still sad, though. I saw him at breakfast today and wow, did he look gorgeous. I mean, he always does, but for some reason he just looked great today.

"Chloe are you going to New York City today?" Scott asked me.

"No, I was supposed to but they called and canceled, why?"

"I was just going to see if you needed someone to go with you; it's not really safe to go by yourself.

"I lived there for two years, it's not that big of a deal for me, but thank you, though," I said with a smile.

"And it's not like she can't take care of herself or anything," Rogue said.

Today was one of her off days, but unsurprisingly, ever since Logan and I have been slightly short with each other, she's been a lot nice to me. I hope she's happy; she jump-started this whole thing. If I had been the one to kiss him at midnight, he probably wouldn't have thought anything about it, because, to be quite honest, I really think that had he not been standing right in front of me, I wouldn't have kissed him or said anything about how I felt. But I did. I am _so_ stupid, why did I do that? Why, why, _why_? I mean, I realize that if he hadn't blatantly declined the prospect of us ever being together, and he had just given in some, I would be the happiest girl in the world. However, with the way things have ended, I am now one of the saddest people ever. I know I must sound like a broken record by now, but I seriously feel like every time I'm close to someone, something happens to take them away. It's like I've got some bad mo-jo going on, or something. True Logan's not _gone_, but we're not the same anymore. I spend all of my time in the library now, the _library_! I'm twenty-two, I should be out having fun, but it seems as though the only person I had to go out and have fun with _was_ Logan. It didn't quite take a month after I was fired from the bar, for me to be just short of forgotten by Kayti and Leah. Oh well, they weren't that great of friends anyway, I suppose.

So, while we were sitting there eating, I caught Logan staring at Jean again…more like Jean and Scott, really. The months that I've been here, I've only seen him look at them like that just a few of times. It's that look of…longing, I guess. Not really romantically, but I can just tell that he wants that, what they have. I know that he wants someone to love him the way that Dr. Grey loves Scott, to have someone who, although faced with beautiful temptation, resisted. To have a love so alive, that even when you're faced with something like death, you're so twined together that nothing can pull you apart. Like there's something so strong between you that even when you're apart, you're still together. To be so in tune with someone that you never need words, you just know them so well that you already know what they're going to say, or what they need, or want. To feel as though you're so connected that they breathe for you. I know that he wants someone who knows all of his flaws, his imperfections, his mistakes, but who doesn't care. He's a grumpy little guy at time, but all Wolverine needs, all he wants, is to have someone who can be just as passionate about him and he is for them. Which can be a little scary at times, because he really is an extremely passionate man. He needs someone who can make him feel like he's everything in their world. He needs someone who's not just looking for a bad boy and a couple of night of fun, but someone who would be proud to show him off, to let everyone know that they had come with him. Someone that when he looked at them from across the room, could make them stronger and weaker all at the same time, just from his stare. He's not ready to settle down, but he wants someone that would be able to tempt him with the idea. I think Logan would like a family. A wife might do him some good and he would do so well with kids or his own, he's already so great with the ones here. I know that he's lonely; he's lived nearly twenty-two years with no family that he knows of and to have something that's his, I know that he wants that. What he doesn't realize, or know, is that I could be that for him. I could, and would, live the rest of my life with him and truly be happy. We would fight, we always do, and at some point I may want out of it, but because I know that he's it for me, the one person that no matter what's gone on in my life, no matter what we've been through together, I've always loved, I know that I would never be able to find anyone that I love like him. No matter how long it takes for us to patch up this thing between us, I know that he loves me. I don't quite know how to articulate into words just how grateful I am for all that he's given me. He's loved me when I've been unlovable, he's taken care of me when I refused his help, he's made me laugh when I wanted to cry and he can say the most honestly real things to make me cry, to move me, and then he consol me when he does. If he treated every woman the way he treated me, they would be lining up for miles just to have the smallest chance to spend time with him, but I don't know how many would stick around after the velvet gloves were taken off. I love him, but everyone knows that Wolvie has a bit of a temper _and_ a mouth on him. I'm not sure just how many women would put up with that part, when he got a little out of hand and right before he would apologize. I'm not real sure how many other woman wouldn't be intimidated by him. I mean, I was when I first met him, to a fifteen-year old, he was a scary old man, but when I realized he wasn't all that mean, he was my best friend. I don't let him growl at me and I call him on it if he offends me, but I also know when he's joking and let him have fun. I don't know how to really explain it, but there's somewhat of an actual, physical ache to not being able to have him, to hold him, to just…touch him. It's crazy, but I actually crave the taste of cigars and cologne that he would leave in my mouth just from being around him. Those few short moments of when I got to kiss him and he was kissing me back, play over in my mind again and again until I feel like it's a drug that I need and am now having withdrawals from. Every time I see him, it's all I can do to keep from grabbing and kissing him. I miss him so badly, especially our day to day banter. We barely speak anymore, let alone argue and get to make up for it.

Well, it's only ten o'clock but nothing's on TV and I have successfully managed to depress myself even more than I was this morning, so I think I'm going to try and sleep some of it off. In the words of Scarlet O'Hara; "After all, tomorrow is another day," Okay, I might have paraphrased that a wee bit; it's been a while since I've seen the movie. So, this is goodnight!

Remember To:

Do laundry

Return books to library

Give Logan back the flannel shirt he let me borrow a few weeks ago while playing poker in his room when I got cold

Forget about loving Logan; it's starting to hurt a little more every day

Chloe,"

Logan laid the book down with a gentle ease. He knew that I knew him well, probably better than anyone else, but he had no idea that I had actually known him _that_ well. That I had known things about him that not only had he never told anyone, but things he had never really let himself believe. How had I known everything that he wanted, how had I known exactly what he was looking for and how had he been so blind as to not see that_ I_ was what he wanted before it was too late?

He grabbed the bottle of whiskey he had in the drawer of his nightstand, replacing it with my journal, and went out onto his balcony, grabbing his leather jacket with his cigars in it on his way out. He slipped it on and sat down in one of the chairs before lighting up a cigar and slowly puffing on it. Then he opened the bottle and took three or four gulps without flinching.

The cold didn't bother him, like real wolverines, he enjoyed it, and so he sat there in near quiet for as long as he could. Come of the older students were out playing in the show beneath him and he watched them. He was upset to see that the snowman that I had made however many weeks before, was barely a lump of snow. Some of it had been knocked around by some of the kids, most of which tried to fix it as they were scared that Logan would go ballistic on them for messing it up. The rest, however, had melted quite a bit. It was still cold in Westchester, but when the sun would rise in the morning, it would melt most of the already fallen snow, which would only fall back down again by that evening. Two of the female students looked up and waved at him so he politely waved back. He wasn't supposed to drink in front of them, but since he was still in his room, he decided that it didn't count.

'_Besides,' _he thought. _'It's not like they don't know I drink,_' He then tipped back the bottle for another long sip.

"Hey, did you forget about me?" Haylie asked, poking her head through the door that led from his bedroom out onto the terrace, which he had forgotten to shut.

"Yeah, sorry," he said, but didn't move, instead he took another long pull of whiskey, followed by sticking his cigar back between his teeth and puffing.

She moved from the doorway and sat down in the chair beside him. "You don't want to go anywhere with me tonight, do you?" she asked.

He looked at her, she was only wearing a skirt, knee high boots and a thin black top. He didn't have the same immediate thought to offer her his jacket, as he would have with Rogue, or me or any of the other girls at the school. He felt she should have been smart enough to put on a jacket of her own, and so he didn't offer her his.

"No, I'm not doin' good tonight," he said honestly.

"Is there anything I can do to make you feel better?"

"Yeah, you could go get me another bottle of Jack," he said around his cigar stub. I'm not sure that I actually ever saw him smoke a full cigar; I think he chopped them all in half to make them look that way. I don't know exactly what purpose that would serve, but it just seemed that way.

"Nothing else?" she asked, placing her hand on his arm.

"No," he said.

There was a long silence as they both watched the students that had been out in the yard in front of them leave to go back inside.

"I don't get it," she finally said.

"Get what?" he asked, leaning forward in his chair so that she had to move her hand.

"You and Chloe,"

"What don't you get?"

"How you worked,"

"There was nothing to it; we just did,"

"But I mean, you were in love with each other, but you knew her when she was a teenager, I just don't get how it worked?"

"I met her when she was fifteen, yeah, but we didn't see each other for six years and she…grew up, I guess,"

"You don't exactly sound happy about that?"

"I wasn't,"

"Why?"

"Because I thought she still should have been that young and when I saw her and she wasn't…I don't know, it felt wrong,"

"Because you were attracted to her?"

"Yeah,"

"So why did the two of you never go out if you were both so in love?"

"Because I didn't want to hurt her," he said taking another drink from his bottle. "But I did,"

"How?"

He sat back and looked over at her. "Chloe…never had anyone to take care of her, except me, and I wanted to. So when she told me that…" he paused, remembering that night clearly and running his hand back through his hair anxiously. He shook his head. "When she told me how she felt I was just afraid that I would let her down, so I told her we couldn't do that whole thing and _that_ let her down, I guess. I shouldn't have been so hard on her, though, we both wanted the same thing, but she was the only one who actually did anything about it,"

"So if she was still alive she would be the one sitting out here with you, not me?"

"No," he said with a faint hint of a smile. "She didn't care too much for the cold,"

* * *

When you're younger, things are much simpler. Telling the truth is always right and telling a lie is always wrong. Once when I was younger, I told a woman that my mother and I went to church with that her hair looked like a bird's nest, which was the truth; it did. I was punished and though I understand why now, I probably still would have informed the woman of what her hair looked like, I didn't like her too much, she always pinched my cheeks and called me Doey, because of my 'big doe eyes'. But I digress; things are much simpler when you're younger because everything's either back or white, but when you get older, you become more aware of all of the gray areas, the things you're not sure of. When is it okay to tell the truth or to lie? Is it fair to actually judge between the two, because to be honest, can't they both help and harm the same depending on the situation? I guess because I always felt the truth was but a mere matter of opinion, I never had a problem with the gray area. I divided it and shuffled each into their own categories, respectively, and went on with my life, following my own set of rules for everything, my own set of ethics. Though our views and opinions differed quite drastically for the most part, Logan and I both followed the same rule; doing what's right means doing what's right for you, right now. However, Professor Xavier didn't agree with our rule, he believed that rules should be set for everyone and didn't appreciate the idea of decentness as a means of getting something done, unless it was absolutely necessary, at which point he only did so because he had no other choice. So it should have come as no surprise when Logan received a mental note from him two days later for him to 'please meet him in his office'. When Logan arrived to his office, he saw that Jean was there as well.

"What can I do for you, Chuck?" he asked, sitting down beside Dr. Grey and giving her a short, small smile.

"I wanted to speak to the both of you about something that I've tried to ignore for the past week or so, but I'm afraid, no longer can,"

"If this is about that rumor that me and Jean are havin' and affair, I can't lie to you Chuck; I've got a thing for red heads in lab coats," he joked and Jean rolled her eyes, but smiled.

"I'm afraid not," he said. "This is about the idea the two of you have to get Miss Robbins to meet her father,"

"What about it?" Logan asked, surprised that the Professor hadn't actually been in on it, not that it was something that he would do, but he had just assumed that Jean had told him about it, since it was _part_ of his original idea.

"It has to stop, you can no longer lead her on the way that you are Logan; she deserves to know what's going on and the truth about the two of you,"

"And what_ is _the truth about the two of us?" Logan asked a little upset; he hated it when someone tried to tell him what to do, even the Professor.

"You know very well that you don't share the same feelings for her as she does for you,"

"Well I don't know, you heard her the other night at dinner; I am her _boyfriend_ now,"

"This is what I'm talking about; you've led her to believe that the two of you are now dating, when you, as well as I, know that you don't care about her the way that she cares about you. It's not right for you to use her the way that you have been,"

He let out a sigh. "Look, this is the only thing that I can do. You know that if she hadn't make me promise not to, I would have already found him and killed him. Unless you wanna' help me out, this is the only thing I know to do,"

"I think we should let the authorities handle it Logan, we're not capable of dealing with it the way they are,"

"And they're doin' a bang up job, aren't they?" he said sarcastically.

"I know how hard this is for you,"

"Just 'cause you can get inside my head and know what's goin' on up there doesn't mean you know how hard this is for me,"

"Logan," Jean said, trying to calm him and placing a hand on his shoulder. "Maybe we should just forget about this and be honest with her about it, she seems…bright, I think she'll understand where we're coming from,"

He looked at her and blinked. "Bright? Sorry Jeanie, but I've spent more time with her than you have and bright ain't what I would call her," he said with a slight chortle. "The only way we're gonna' catch him is if she helps us and right now, if I tell her all of this, she's not gonna' do it,"

"Well I'm afraid that I have decided to ask her to leave, so I'm sorry to say that you don't have any other options but to let the proper authorities deal with it,"

"Why?"

"Because this is my house and my school and it is my job to protect my staff and students in everyway possible. The rumor that Miss Robbins started about Marie simply because she was jealous of the relationship the two of you share is something that I _will_ not tolerate,"

"I get that, but give me a week,"

"No,"

"Chuck, just give me until the end of this week, if I can't get her to meet with him then you can tell her to get out of her. Just the rest of the week…please," he pleaded. Logan not rarely, but _never_, pleaded and the words sounded foreign coming from his mouth, but it was sincere and the Professor knew it.

"Alright, if you can persuade Miss Robbins to meet with her father by the end of this week, I will help you to set up the meeting, if not, I would hope you tell her the truth before she leaves, because I will be asking her to leave by Monday,"

He nodded his head. "Thank you," he said and then stood. "If that's all you wanted me for, I gotta' go,"

"Yes, that's all I needed," he said and then Logan walked to the door. "Oh, and Logan,"

He turned back around. "Yeah?"

"Good luck,"

"Yeah, thanks,"


	8. Never Enough

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything from Marvel, but I'm sick and I think it would be very lovely of you to not sue me...please? Oh, I also don't own the rights to either of the songs used in this chapter, but they're two of my favorite. The first is 'I Can Still Feel You' which I loved ever since I was like, ten. The other one is called '24 Hours' and if you want to look it up, it's by an artist named Jem and I love her voice and the music is brilliant. I love doing song stories because I get to peddle my odd music taste off onto everyone else. Muwhahaha! Yeah, like I said, I'm sick. Please enjoy the next chapter!

* * *

Logan felt a hand brush against his face and woke up, sat up bolt right and looked around his room wide eyed. There was no one there. His breath panted and he shook his head. He had been dreaming about me and somehow thought that he felt me running a hand down his cheek. As he was catching his breath, he heard footsteps coming down the hall and stop in front of his door. He sniffed the air and could tell that it was Haylie; what did she want? Slowly she pushed open the door.

"Hey, are you okay?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she lied.

"I heard you talking in my room, were you having a bad dream or something?"

"No," he said. He had actually been having a good dream about me and wished that she would leave so that he could go over it in his mind before it faded away from him.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah," he said, still trying to catch his breath and ran his hand back through his hair.

"Was it about…Chloe?"

He debated whether to tell her and decided it would be the perfect opportunity to make good with the deal that he and the Professor had made earlier that day. He looked at her and nodded his head. "Yeah, it was,"

She took his response as an invitation to let herself in the rest of the way, and so she did, and went and sat on the edge of his bed. "Do you dream about her a lot?"

"I didn't used to,"

"But ever since she died you have?"

"Yeah,"

"Good dreams or bad dreams?"

"Both,"

"And tonight?"

"Good one,"

"What was it about?"

"It, uh…it was about the time we drove to Seattle together,"

"Seattle from Westchester?"

"No, from Laughlin City in Northern Alberta, Canada," he said with a small smile. "It took fourteen hours to get there and I think she only slept for about two or there of them, so she talked nearly the whole time,"

"What did you talk about?"

"Whatever she wanted, she would turn on the radio to some bad music station and then talk over it. She was entertainin' to be with,"

"When did you go?"

"About six and a half years ago,"

"Why?"

"'Cause her father was getting' out of prison and she wanted to meet him,"

"Did she like him?"

"She didn't meet him that day; she met him at her trial when she found out why he was in jail,"

"Why was he?"

He looked her right in the eye. "Chuck didn't tell you?"

"I didn't ask,"

"She said he killed a kid who lived next to 'em 'cause he was a mutant,"

"He killed someone before Chloe?"

Although it had been nearly a month since my death, her question still stung as she tossed around the words to carelessly. "Yeah,"

"Why?"

He paused for a second. "I don't know…" he said, shaking his head. "I don't know,"

She was quiet for a while. "So, this isn't _just_ about her then, is it? You want him to be put back in jail because he's killed two mutants?"

'_No,'_ he thought. _'It's all about her,'_

"Yeah," he said dumbly, feeling as though that had been his only appropriate response to every one of her questions.

"If I go and talk to the Professor tomorrow to see if he can help me, will you go with me?"

He nodded his head. "If you want me to, yeah,"

She grabbed his hand and held it. "I think I would feel better if you were with me,"

Logan wondered how he found himself in the predicament that he was in; there was a beautiful, young girl sitting in his room, wearing a shot, reveling nightgown and he couldn't have been less interested in a woman than he was her right then.

Haylie stayed in his room for another good thirty minutes before he casually mentioned that he was tired and had classed the next day…aright, so perhaps _not_ so casually, he pretty much told her that she was going to have to leave so that he could sleep. I don't know why she put up with him being quite as rude to her as he was, granted he was even trying to be nice. However, if he had acted like that with me, I would have told him to check his attitude with me, but I guess that was the difference between the two of us; I actually had some self-respect. Then again, Logan would never have treated me that way; I was, after all, _his _darlin'.

_It's that feeling that someone  
Is standing behind me  
And I turn around and there's no one there.  
And it's the sensation  
That someone just whispered  
Yeah and I still hear your voice but you're not really here.  
Your memory is like a ghost  
And my heart is it's host. _

I can still feel you just as close as skin  
Every now and then  
All by myself, in a crowded room, or my empty bed  
There's a place you've touched  
With your love no one gets close to  
I can still feel you,

_I can still feel you, _

_I can still feel you, _

_I can still feel you_

* * *

"So, you know what you're supposed to be doin' right?" Logan asked Haylie as they sat in his car in the parking lot of a bar that they were waiting for her to go into.

"Yeah, I go in, I talk to him, I'll get a call on my cell phone from Dr. Grey who will then call the Montreal Police Department and send them over here to arrest him,"

The two of them, along with Jean, had flown to Montreal, Canada that Saturday to meet with our father. With the help of the Professor, they had been able to get in touch with him and set up a meeting. Haylie had fed him a long, very detailed, albeit fake, story about how she had 'always wanted to know him and wanted to meet with him as soon as she could'. Professor Xavier had done his best to get into his head enough to make him agree to it without him finding anything suspicious. It had worked and he had agreed to meet her in a bar in the town where he was hiding. He had, however, failed to mention that that was in fact what he was doing; hiding.

"Yeah, but when Jean calls you, you can't let him know what it's about, so you've gotta' make something up,"

"Like what?"

"I don't know, this is your idea, you'll think of something," he said.

"Alright," she said and then unbuckled herself. "So do I get a good luck kiss or anything?" she asked, but didn't wait for his response. Instead, she leaned over from her seat and crushed her mouth down against his, kissing him fiercely. Now, Logan's skill has amazed me but perhaps he was getting a little _too_ into character, because he seemed to actually be enjoying himself while kissing her.

After a few minutes, he finally pulled himself away and swore. "You better go in there or he's gonna' wonder where you're at,"

"Yeah, okay," she said before climbing out of the car. "Why don't you come in with me, maybe I won't be so nervous that way if you're in there with me?"

"He's seen me before, I can't,"

"But you'll come in and get me if I need you, right?"

"Yeah, don't worry about it. If anything's gonna' go wrong, Jean'll tell me and I'll come and get you,"

"Alright," she said, biting the edge of her lip out of nervousness for once. "I guess I'll see you in a little bit, then,"

"Yeah, okay," he said and then she shut the passenger's side door.

He watched her walk from the car up to the bar and go in and then he waited as Jean opened the same door and climbed into the seat beside Logan's.

"So, how much good luck do you think she's going to need for this to work?" she asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, it's just that her good luck kiss lasted an awfully long time, I was just curious about how much luck you thought she might need," she teased.

"Not a word to anyone,"

"You are her boyfriend after all,"

"Jean," he warned.

She laughed and then they were both silent for a few minutes, just watching the door to the bar. "You know, you really shouldn't worry about anything, it's all going to work out,"

"Yeah, but it's not gonna' bright her back, though,"

"Logan, you can't do anything to bring her back, but you're doing everything you know how to do to somehow make it as right as it can be, even though it never will be right," she said. "I _am_ sorry Logan, I know that you really loved her and still do, but everything's going to be fine, you're going to be okay,"

He picked up her hand and kissed it. "I know Jean, it's just gonna' take me a while, I still miss her,"

"You're always going to miss her and long as she's gone, that's just how it works, but I know you and I think that after this ordeal is over with and Haylie's gone you'll be able to rest a little easier. And to be quite honest with you; you could do with a little more rest,"

"I can't right now,"

"You're going to have to; it's not healthy for you to be this stressed out all the time. I've never seen you like this before, not even when you first got to the school,"

"I was like this when you were gone,"

"Well, I wasn't there to see it and somehow I think this is a little bit worse, you really loved her, didn't you?"

"Did you have to read my mind to figure that out?" he joked.

"No, it's just the woman in me," she smiled.

"Yeah," he said slowly. "I did,"

"You always did, it was just in a different way when she was younger,"

"You don't know how many nights I spent awake, just wanting to go and take her away. She was only sixteen," he said, playing with the bracelet on Jean's wrist, the one that he had bought her. "When Chuck told me that I had a wife and a kid and that if they hadn't been killed she would have been sixteen, all I could think about was that she would have been the same age as Chloe was when I left her. Maybe that's why I wanted to take care of her, maybe there was something in me that remembered my little girl and knew that could've been her in some bar, waitin' on a bunch of drunk guys, sloberin' all over her. I don't know, but that night when I saw her and she was grown up…there was something about it that killed me that I hadn't been there that whole time,"

"But you couldn't have been,"

"I know, she knew that too, I just wish that I could have taken care of her the way she deserved to be. I don't know how to explain it, but I was…relieved, I guess, when I saw her again and knew that she was okay. I had never been as happy as I was while she was livin' at the school. I could keep an eye out for her, take care of her and then one day I looked at her and I don't know what happened. I always knew she was beautiful; she was gorgeous when she was younger and I knew her, but something that day made me realize she wasn't a kid anymore. I tried to not think about it, 'cause I thought there was something wrong with it. How had I gone from thinkin' about her like a kid that I wanted to take care of to all of a sudden thinking about her…the way that I do now,"

"There's nothing wrong with that, you were both adults,"

"I know," he said with a sigh. "You better call her; I think it's been long enough now,"

"Yeah, you're right," she said.

After Jean called Haylie to make sure that the meeting was going well and was assured that it was, she called the local police department, which arrived in only fifteen minutes. They had to speak to Haylie and after an hour of questioning her, they let her go and the three of them all headed home.

* * *

"So, how are you feeling?" Jean asked Logan as he came to sit in the seat beside her as she was flying the jet.

"Like it's not good enough,"

"You'll probably feel that way for a while,"

"Yeah, but this is what I was waitin' on, this is what she wanted, but it doesn't feel like it's enough,"

"I know," she said quietly. "You better go check on Haylie; I think she's still a little shook up,"

He looked back at her sitting in her seat. While she had been talking to our father, he told her about going to jail for killing that boy; he had also explained what he had done, proudly and in very graphic detail. It had scared me terribly, causing horrid nightmares which led to many sleepless nights, but for someone like her, someone who had been sheltered all of her life from anyone other than people like herself; rich and uppity, it got inside her a little deeper. I had always grown up knowing that some people did evil things. I had lost my mother in a murder-homicide by my own stepfather and I had seen a lot of cruel things in the foster care that I had lived in, but to her, the things he said only happened in scary slasher movies. I knew there were terrible people who did terrible things, it was all very real to me and still what he had done had been enough to haunt me. I could only imagine what it had done to her.

"You alright?" Logan asked, sitting down in the seat next to hers.

"Yeah, I'm fine," she lied.

"Good," he said and sat back in his seat. As much as she needed to be comforted, he couldn't do it, but more to the point, wouldn't. If she wasn't going to say something was wrong, the he wasn't going to drag it out of her; he had enough to think about as it was.

It didn't take too long for them to get back to the mansion and once they got there, Logan went straight to his room. He grabbed his nearly empty bottle of whiskey and went out onto his terrace. He knew that just sending my father to prison wasn't going to bring me back or even make his pain any less than it was, but he felt completely unsatisfied with just letting him go to jail. He had done everything he could to stay inside of his car when he watched the police drag him out of the bar. He so wanted to just take his claws and cut him open. He wanted to guy him. He had seen him, saw that he hadn't regretted what he had done to me and that brought up more rage inside of him. He wanted to kill him more than he had ever had a desire to kill someone. He wanted to watch him die slow and painfully. No, he decided, he didn't want him to die, because then it would be over to him. He wanted him to suffer as much as possible. To cut him apart, piece by piece, slowly so that he felt it all. The alcohol did nothing for him, it dulled no pain, but it gave him something to do while he mentally tore my father apart.

"Ain't it too cold for you out here?" Rogue asked, joining him out on his terrace. She didn't sit down; instead, she stood right in front of him, as she leaned back against the railing.

"No, but you should probably go back in," he said, puffing on his cigar.

"Nope, you're not gettin' rid of me right now," she said with a kind smile. "How did it go today?"

He looked up at her and cocked an eyebrow. "You mean the whole school ain't already talkin' about it?"

"No, they're all talkin' about Haylie and how _brave_," she said, rolling her eyes. "She was for actually doin' something. Apparently, everyone thinks he knew she was a mutant and she went there anyway. If Jean hadn't told me she was one, I wouldn't even know. She goes through so much trouble to hide it so everyone'll think she's perfect,"

"Let her gloat; we needed her, we used her and she's gonna' be leavin' soon,"

"When?"

"Beginning of the week, Monday, I don't know,"

"Are you gonna' be sad when she leaves?"

"No," he answered quickly.

"Why not?"

"Because I don't like her, kid," he said with a swig of his whiskey.

"Good, me either,"

"Really, I thought the two of you got on pretty well?" he said sarcastically.

"You're right, I'm just sayin' that to make you feel better," she joked. "So, how _did_ it go?"

"They arrested him and he's being brought back here to the states. I don't know what they're gonna' do now, though,"

"They'll try him for murder, I'm sure, but then he ran away and left for Canada, so I think they might could get him for something on that. If they bring up that she's a mutant he could be charged for hate crimes, too,"

"And only sent to jail for thirteen years like last time," he spat angrily.

"Well, they might not bring it up," she said, pulling her jacket to her. "I didn't really hate her as much as I thought I did, I think I was just kind'a jealous of her,"

"Why?" he asked, looking up at her. She looked so beautiful with the light of the moon shining around her, lighting her fact. His little Marie had grown up, all right in front of him.

"Well, when she came here, you pair more attention to her than to me and I got a little mad,"

He shook his head. "I didn't give her more attention that you, you got married, you weren't my girl anymore, you're Bobby's,"

"I'm always gonna' be yours Logan, and you're always gonna' be mine. I've got a little too much of you up here," she said, tapping a gloved finger to the side of her head. "For you to be anyone else's,"

He smiled at her. "That's not always a good thing; me bein' up there,"

"Yeah, well, you keep the others in line; I think they're a little scared of you,"

"They should me,"

"I'm not," she smirked.

"Have you ever been?" he asked, tipping back his whiskey bottle. "I think you were the only kid in class when I first started teachin' that didn't tell Chuck when I yelled at you,"

"I'm used to your yells and growls by now," she said and then they both fell quiet for a few minutes.

"I'm sorry," he said after a while.

"For what?" she asked,

"If I didn't give you enough attention while she was here,"

"You gave me enough, just not as much as her, but I guess you had a lot to make up for, didn't you?"

He nodded his head. "Yeah,"

"I think I might have actually liked her just a little bit, I just didn't want her to know," He let out a small chuckle. "You can't tell her that, though," He looked up at her. "Am I not supposed to know that you talk to her?"

"No, it's fine,"

"I think it's good. I used to talk to my momma after I left home; it made me feel better to be able to tell her what was goin' on in my life. After a while I stopped 'cause I didn't need to talk to her as much, I had you and everyone else here. One day you might stop talkin' to her, but right now I think it's good for you, you need it," She said to him and he nodded his head. "I won't tell anyone,"

"I know,"

"Are you gonna' tell Haylie that you don't really like her before she leaves?"

"Yeah,"

"Are you gonna' tell her why you were actin' like you did?"

"I guess so," he said, taking another sip.

"Good,"

He looked up at her and smiled. "You're lookin' forward to me tellin' her, aren't you?"

"What, me? That would be mean and _I'm_ certainly not mean," she said with a small smirk. Rogue wasn't mean, but when it came to her family, she, like Logan, was very protective and so everything she said about Logan, the other teachers, even me, it all mad Rogue more than just a little upset with her and so yes; she _was_ looking forward to Logan telling Haylie everything that was really going on. He laughed and shook his head. "I think that's the first time I've heard you really laugh in about a month,"

"Come over here," he said, setting his bottle down and grabbing her hand. He pulled her over to him and sat her down in his lap. He kissed the top of her head and held her to him as he would a child. "I'm proud of you, Marie,"

"For what?" she asked, resting her head against his chest and playing with the zipper on his jacket.

"For growin' up as well as you have; if anyone else had to deal with the same things as you, they would've been screwed up,"

"So you think I'm grown up?" she asked, looking up at him.

"No that I'm happy about it, but yeah, you are,"

"Well, you're partly to blame for home I turned out, you know?"

"Am I?" he asked with a smirk.

"Yep, it's your fault," she said and then she fell silent for a moment. "Logan?"

"Hm?" he grunted.

"When you get done with that bottle of whiskey, do you have another one?"

"Why, do you want some?" he joked.

"No,"

"No, that's the only one I've got right now, why?"

"I was just thinkin' that maybe you cold go a week or two without it, for me,"

"Yeah, I'll see what I can do, kid,"

"Kid? I thought just a few minutes ago I was all grown up?" she teased.

He laughed at she felt it rumble through his chest. He was getting better and she was helping. The last time he had seen me in his room and I was talking to him, I had told him that I would never leave him because I would always be in everything that made him laugh and smile, which right then was Marie. He held her close to him, knowing that it was true, that as long as he had Rogue, or Jean, or Storm, or any of the people he considered his family, then he would have me. There's always a turning point during any grieving process and Logan was experiencing his right then. He was still sad that I was gone, but he realized he always would be, no matter if it was four weeks or four years. But right then, he noticed something; he didn't have to remind himself to breathe. From the moment that I had died, he had had to make himself breathe, move, speak, everything that at one point, had been simple and natural, but with the fog of pain, had caused him to forget. And he knew from then on, as he sat, holding Rogue and breathing on his own, that he was going to be okay, a little rough, a little hurt, but he _was_ going to survive it all. That's what he did; he adapted to the situation and he survived everything that he had been through. Losing me may have been a bigger blow to him than anything else may have been, but sure enough, he was still alive, everything was still moving around him and life was continuing on. Even if it had seemed like everything else had faded out in the background, had slowly moved past him, it had all kept moving and though he wasn't eager just yet to join everyone in their normal lives, he knew that one day, at some point in time, he was going to go back to his normal life. However, he was quite content at that moment just to be holding someone that he loved that was still alive. She was a silent reminder of everything good that he still had. Sometimes good can come out of something bad. In his case, Logan knew to never take a single second of his time with her for granted, and he didn't, because however depressing and pessimistic it sounded, he learned that at the least expecting time, he could lose her or anyone else and he wasn't going to take any chances.

_Been given 24 hours  
to tie up loose ends  
to make amends.  
His eyes said it all  
I started to fall  
and the silence deafened.  
Head spinning round  
no time to sit down  
just wanted to  
run and run and run.  
Be careful they say  
don't wish life away,  
now I've one day. _

And I can't believe  
How I've been wasting my time.

In 24 hours, they'll be  
laying flowers  
on my life, it's over tonight.  
I'm not messing no I  
need your blessing  
and your promise to live free  
please do it for me.

Is there a heaven a hell  
and will I come back  
who can tell?  
Now I can see  
what matters to me  
it's as clear as crystal.  
The places I've been  
the people I've seen  
plans that I made  
start to fade.  
The sun's setting gold  
thought I would grow old,  
it wasn't to be.

And I can't believe  
How I've been wasting my time.

In 18 hours, they'll be  
laying flowers  
on my life, it's over tonight.  
I'm not messing no I  
need your blessing  
and your promise to live free  
please do it for me.

I'm not alone, I sense it, I sense it  
All that I said, I meant it, I meant it.

And I can't believe  
How much I've wasted my time.

_In just 1 hour they'll be  
laying flowers  
on my life, it's over tonight.  
I'm not messing no I  
need your blessing  
and your promise to live free  
please do it for me. _


	9. Finding The Truth

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything from Marvel or the rights to either of these songs which are titled; "You Were Just Here," and "I Probably Wouldn't Be This Way." Mind the mistakes and typos if there are any, I'm extremely sick today and my head has been killing me so I wasn't able to concentrate the way I would have liked. Anyway, I hope you like this chapter as there's only one more left. Please enjoy!

* * *

"Are you gonna' tell her?"

"Tell her what?"

"That you hate her and hope she dies?"

"I don't want her to die Marie, I just want her to go home," Logan said to Rogue the next day before dinner. He was looking over the dining room to see if Haylie was sitting at the staff table when Rogue came up behind him.

"You want her to die, go home, same thing," she said, resting her hand on his shoulder. "You want me to sit with you?"

"Where's Bobby?" he asked, looking around.

"He has to work late, but don't worry about him, he's fine about everything now,"

"Good," he said. "Yeah, you can sit with me if you want,"

Together they both walked to the staff table and sat down beside each other.

"Logan, don't you want to sit beside me?" Haylie asked and everyone turned to look at him to hear his answer.

"I just wanna' eat and go to the gym," he said, scooping a large spoonful of Jambalaya onto his plate.

"Don't you want to go out and do something tonight?"

"I've got classes tomorrow, so I can't, I gotta' get ready for 'em,"

"Oh, okay…"

"So Haylie, when are you going back home?" Scott asked. Although the question had been burning on everyone's lips, he had been the only one to actually ask her. Funnily enough, it hadn't seemed rude or tactless; it had seemed merely curious and casual.

"Oh, well, I hadn't really thought much about it, I just thought I would stay here for a while,"

"Don't your parents miss you?"

"Yes, but they understand that I'm here, helping Logan to get over Chloe, so they're okay,"

Jean made a choking sound and everyone knew what she was laughing about that made her to begin choking on her water. She thought she was helping him to get over me, when all she had done since she had arrived that was helpful was to get our father arrested, other than that, she had just caused trouble and been a nuisance.

"Well, we're takin' care of him, we know how, so you don't have to worry about it; you can go home if you want," Rogue said.

Haylie gave her a look that meant death masked with a sickly sweet fake smile. "I'm sure you would like that, wouldn't you?"

"Actually, yeah, I would," Rogue said with her own smile.

"You know, Logan is _my_ boyfriend," she said.

"The only person I've heard call Logan your boyfriend is you, had he ever said that the two of you were dating, or did you just make it up like you did about the two of us?" Rogue shot back.

Normally Professor Xavier would have stopped the arguments at the dinner table, however, he saw nothing wrong with Rogue's comments, and he felt she had the right to be angry with her and that he questions were earnest. That, and to be quite honest, he didn't care too much for her, either. She had caused too much trouble in his home and school and so he allowed Marie to go on with the conversation.

"I didn't make up anything about the two of you,"

"You said we were havin' and affair; could be me, but I think you've got a problem with hearin' and seein' things that don't really happen,"

"Whether you want to admit it or not, I saw the two of you together, he kissed you and I heard you saying that you loved him," she said smugly.

"Are you jealous that he would rather kiss me with my poisonous skin than to kiss you?"

"So you're admitting that he _did_ kiss you then?"

"Maybe I am, why, would that make you mad?"

"No, I know that you're only trying to make yourself feel better because you're jealous that he likes me and not you. Besides, Logan wouldn't do something like that to me,"

"Have you _met_ Logan, 'cause you sure don't seem to know a lot about him,"

"You're so jealous it's pathetic,"

"Of what, 'cause it ain't you,"

"You're jealous because he's not scared to touch _my_ skin,"

I, however out spoken I was, would _never_ have thrown that up in her face. Some things are just off limits during an argument, her powers being one. Her extremely rude comment caused a gasp from the other woman at the table.

"Logan's not scared to touch me,"

"Are you sure about that?"

"Positive," she said and before anyone knew what she was doing, Rogue had grabbed both sides of Logan's face with her gloved hands and planted a just long enough kiss on his bare lips to prove a point without stealing any of his energy away.

"Marie, what is going on?" Bobby asked from behind the two of them. He had, unfortunately, walked in a little too late to understand what was happening.

"I was just provin' to Haylie that Logan's not scared of my skin," she promptly defended.

"And the only way to do that was to_ kiss_ him?"

"Well, I wasn't really thinkin' about how else I could do it," she said sheepishly.

"Look," Logan said, standing up and throwing down his napkin onto the table. "I'm goin' to my room, if anyone bothers me then you better have something for me to run my claws through besides you," He walked from the room and started to the staircase.

"Logan, is it possible for you to keep your hands off my wife?" Bobby asked heatedly, following him.

Logan stopped, turned around and got right into his face. "I didn't have my hands on her, but if you wanna' take care of your wife then I suggest that you go back in there with her,"

"Is that a threat? I'm not some stupid little kid, you don't scare me and you can't intimidate me anymore,"

"I'm not threatin' you, I'm sayin' that Haylie's probably in there already on her right now and if you want to take care of her so badly then you should be in there takin' up for her," he said and then turned and walked away.

The stress that Haylie had created in those few short weeks was enough to make even Chuck lose his patients and so for someone like Logan, who lost his patients and temper so easily, he couldn't be in the same room with her any longer. True he and Bobby weren't what you would call best friends by any means, but she had brought up enough tense situations between the two that it was going to take a while for Logan to earn back Bobby's trust, which at that moment, was the farthest thing from his mind.

Once he reached his room, he walked in and nearly slammed the door off its hinges. He went to grab his car keys, the thought of going to buy more whiskey on his mind, but then remembered that he had told Marie he wouldn't drink for a week or two and so instead, he sat down on his bed, willing himself to see me, but it didn't work. He wanted to see me, to talk to me, to have me convince him that one day he would be okay.

"Chloe, I miss you darlin'," he whispered quietly to his room.

There sat a broken man. Logan had always been broken, but slowly, little by little, someone who loved him would come along and give a piece of his life back to him. Rogue had been the one whom had spent many restless nights to help him put all of the jumbled pieces together, and I had come in at the end, with the one, big piece that finished it all. With me, his life felt complete, and without me, he couldn't quite make out the picture. Poor Rogue probably felt like all of her work was in vain, but it wasn't. If it had been opposite, with me in her position, he would have been just as complete with her as he was me. If she had left him, he would have cried just as hard, hurt just as badly and felt just as alone as he did right then. Logan was used to being alone, he had been for fifteen-years of his life, but once he met Rogue and me, there was never a moment he had felt alone. Whether it had been because he was with her or thinking of me, it didn't matter, but right then, he felt alone like he never had.

He looked up at his nightstand and saw my journal. If there had been anyone thing that had helped him the most in that month, it had been reading my journal. To him there was something comforting about being able to read the words that only I had seen. He felt as though even if I couldn't be there with him to tell him my most random thoughts, he could at least read what I had been thinking. He picked up the journal and curiously flipped to the last entry. It was dated the day before my death.

"Dear Journal,

Wow, today has been extremely emotional for me, both good and bad. While I was getting ready for breakfast, I got a call from Christine, the girl I interviewed last week, telling me that she had decided against going to school here. I was, and still am, quite sad. I think she would have done so well here, but I guess she didn't feel the same.

Anyway, after that whole ordeal, I went down to eat breakfast and it seemed like both Logan and the Professor were trying to avoid me. I mean, yeah, Logan and I haven't exactly been making nice lately, but he usually speaks to me some at least, but today he seemed…aloof. Chuck, on the other hand, almost seemed to be doing all that he could to not look in my general direction, let alone in the eye. I went halfway through eating thinking that I had food stuck in my teeth or had something on my face, until I realized that it was just me. So, with my extremely sunny disposition (Ha), I headed off to the library, where I studied up on some student files. I got kind of caught up in the files, so I worked through lunch. That and I really didn't want to have to sit through Logan and the Professor just slight of ignoring me once again. Once lunch was over, who should be coming and sitting down beside me but my dear Wolverine? He asked me to go to Canada with him during the summer. I didn't answer him right then, because I didn't know what to do. Truth be told, I was a little shocked; we haven't really had a proper conversation in weeks and then all of a sudden, today he comes and asks me to go on a road trip with him.

Well, if _that_ wasn't enough to get my head spinning as it was, Logan said that the Professor wanted to see me in his office. So I went in, slightly nervous. While I say there, he told me that he had a feeling that I was in trouble. Yes, he _calmly_ told me that he thought I should go with Logan to Canada this summer because he felt as though the danger I was in wouldn't be until then and that way I could avoid it. At first, I panicked, I mean, _completely _panicked, I think I might have even yelled at him once or twice. After panicking I thought that perhaps Logan had some how swindled him into convincing me that I was in danger just so that I would go to Canada with him, but then thought that maybe Logan hadn't been the swindler but perhaps the Professor had been. What if _he_ had talked Logan into taking me with him on his trip? Well, naturally, I was upset at more than just the thought of that. I was scared, because one; the Professor said I was in danger, two; he didn't really know how or when, and three; I'm in freakin' _danger_! By the time we were through with our conversation, he had assured me that I would be fine for the next few months and that when I went out; Logan had agreed to take care of me. Of course he did, he's always taken care of me, even when he's a little bit mad at me.

After dinner, I was a bag of nerves and so I thought that I could hit the gym for a while and knock around the punching bag for an hour or two. However, I never quite got to it. On my way to the gym, Logan stopped me. We had a nice little heart to heart that's been long over due. To finally get to talk to him and to hear what he had to say to me felt like a weight had been lifted from me. He told me that he loved me, and although I've always known that, going as long as we have without really speaking, just to hear him say that to me made me feel…I don't know. I don't know quite how to articulate into words how nice it felt to just cry, to have him hold me and when I told him that I loved him to hear him say that he loved me, too. We agree that even though we felt the same way about each other, we're going to be just friend. True, I would sill chew my own right arm off to be with him, I think I'm good with just having him back for now; I missed him. Oh, and by the way, I found out that me going to Canada with him was all his idea and that when he had gone to the Professor to ask for the summer off, he knew he was going to ask me and told him he thought it was a good idea. So I told him yes, I'm so excited now, I can't wait to take a road trip with him. Our trip to Seattle was so much fun and we barely knew each other then.

So, after we finished talking about our relationship and settled on something, we headed to the kitchen. I wanted some hot chocolate and he wanted to play poker.

"So, did you miss me beating you?" I asked with a slight smirk as we sat beside each other at the island playing. I know you're supposed to probably sit opposite of each other while playing cards, but I had missed being with him and so I sat right next to him, as close as I could get to try and make up for the lost space between us.

"I think I'm the one who's beatin' you, darlin'," he said with his own smirk.

"I'm letting you win; I don't want you to feel bad,"

"You're _letting_ him win? That's not fun," Scott said, walking into the kitchen.

"She's not _lettin_' me; I'm winnin' on my own,"

I rolled my eyes at Scott and he smiled at me. You know, I wonder what color his eyes are? I bet they're blue…yes, I think that he has black hair and blue eyes. Or they could be red; I suppose that would be logical. Hm…no, I think they're blue. He's so cute! Anyway, he grabbed a bag of chips from the pantry, came over, and gave me a kiss on the cheek.

"Stop letting him win Chloe; he's got enough to gloat about without it,"

"Yeah, I suppose you're right. Oh, and good luck to you're team tonight,"

"What team?" he asked as Logan dealt me a new hand.

"Aren't you watching a game?"

"No, Jean and I are going to watch a movie together,"

"You're taking a bag of chips to watch a movie with your wife?"

"Bad idea?"

"Very bad idea," I shook my head. Men.

He put the bag of chips in the pantry. "You two have fun," he said as he walked from the kitchen. He then turned around and gave me a look that felt like if he hadn't had his glasses on, might have involved a wink.

"So, you and Scooter got something goin' on?" Logan asked once Scott was gone.

"Oh yeah, we're in the middle of a hot and heavy romantic affair with one another. See what happens when I can't have you; I'm forced to move onto someone else," I joked.

He smiled and let out a small laugh. "Not settin' very high standards for yourself, are you kid?"

"Ha, ha, so funny," I said dryly wining the new hand. "I like Scott, he's a good guy. He's very brotherly to me,"

"Brotherly?" he asked with a cocked eyebrow.

"Yeah, brotherly, it refers to the bond between a brother and a sister in sibling relationship, which has been how the two of us have responded to one another,"

"I know what it means,"

"Then why did you say it like that?"

"Because I wanted to see how you would explain it," he said with a smirk. "It was worth it,"

"I'm glad that you get so much entertainment from how I speak, it brings joy to my heart to know that I can amuse you," I said, rolling my eyes. I put two of my cards down and he touched my hand as he handed me my two new ones. My heart still skips when he touches me. He kept his hand there on mine, prolonging the touch. He looked me in the eye and I did my best to smile at him. "You know, even though we're not…going out, or whatever, we both still like each other, right? So I think it would be okay if you ever wanted to…touch my hand, or something, I think it was fall in the rules of us still being friends,"

"I thought we could just make up our own rules," he said and then picked up my hand and kissed it.

I leaned closer to him. "If you just trying to woo me so that I'll let you win again, it's not going to work," I said with a wink.

"Well, I thought it wouldn't hurt," he said and smiled at me.

"I missed you,"

He let out a deep breath and continued to hold my hand to him. "I missed you too, darlin'," I bit my lip. "What are you thinkin' about?" he asked.

"Can we…" I started and trailed off.

"Can we what?"

"Not go this long without talking to each other again, I really didn't like it,"

He nodded his head. "Yeah," he said. "Come here," He took my hand, pulled me to him and held me.

"Don't ever leave me," I said to him, wrapping my arms around his neck. He held me to him with one hand and cradled my head with his other.

"I'm not goin' to," he whispered in my ear and kissed me on my temple. "I'm not goin' anywhere,"

It took us a while, but we finally finished our hand of poker. I won. Afterwards we didn't feel like playing anymore and since we both have to get up early in the morning, we decided to go to bed. He walked me to my room, like he used to and I realized how much I missed him.

"Well, goodnight," I said, tucking my hair behind my ears.

"Night,"

I turned to open my door and go inside as he started towards his room. "Logan?"

"Yeah?" he said, turning back around.

I walked over to him and kissed him on the cheek. "I love you and I'm sorry if I did anything to hurt you,"

"Darlin' you didn't do anything to hurt me," he said and then kissed me on top of my head. "I love you too, kid, goodnight,"

"Goodnight," I said again and walked into my room.

So today has been emotional, to say the least. I don't feel quite as scared as I did this afternoon. I know that Logan will do his best to take care of me and _that_ makes me feel safe.

Well, I'm tired and I've got to get up really early tomorrow, so I think I'm going to go now. I need to sit out my clothes for the interview; I think I'm going to wear my cowboy boots for the first time. I need to make it good; it's probably going to be the last time I go out until this summer. Who knows, tomorrow may be the best day of my life? I'll write back tomorrow night and tell you. All right, this is goodnight, so goodnight!

Remember To:

Do Laundry

Buy Valentine's Day cards for everyone

Take back all of the student files to Chuck

Start planning on what to take with me to Canada this summer. I'm so excited!

Chloe,"

Logan closed the book, and though he sat it down gently, he felt angry, mostly with himself. He wondered then, more than ever, why he had just let me go the way that he had. The reasons that he had had for not wanting me to be with him, seemed incredibly trivial and unimportant. He felt as though he had let me get away. If he loved me and I loved him, then what was holding him back, what was his problem? he wondered. Why had he not only just turned me down but also not been the first to tell me how he felt? He had loved me for so long and yet he had let me be the one to make the first, and only, move. It was one of those things where he saw the situation as if he had done something different, if he had taken control of what was going on between us, then it would have been better. In his pained hindsight, he thought that different would have meant better. However, while he was full of regret, he didn't realize that different could have meant worse. What if we had been together, something happened and then I died mad at him? Or, what if nothing had happened but we had just been together when I died, how much more would that have hurt him? If it had ever been possible to break a broken man, I had succeeded in doing so.

He stood from his bed and decided that he was going to go to the gym; he needed to his something and thought it would be better for him to go there than to wait for Scott or Bobby to show up at his door and hit them instead. So he took off his flannel shirt and tossed it absentmindedly to the floor before walking from his room and into the hall. He was walking past my room door when he heard someone moving around in there. He paused and sniffed, hoping his instinct was wrong and that it was just Jean or Storm putting some of my stuff that had been left in the laundry room, den or living room away so that it wouldn't get hurt, but he was right, he always was, and that was one time he wished he could have been wrong.

He opened the door and saw that my room had been turned upside down. Most of my things had been scattered about and what hadn't been, seemed to be packed away in various boxes that littered my floor. He heard Haylie in my closet and saw her toss a few articles of my clothing to the floor, joining a pile that she had been working on for, judging by the size of it, quite a while. He had wanted to keep it the way that I had left it and Professor Xavier had said that he could, acknowledging that he wasn't ready to go through my things right then, so seeing my room in complete disarray heightened the rage that he had been bottling up for her since she had arrived just after my funeral.

"What are you doin'?" he asked uncharacteristically calm, walking up to her inside of my nearly empty closet.

"I'm cleaning out this room. I've realized that as long as her stuff is still here, you and everyone else are refusing to move on, so I'm doing something that everyone is too afraid to do and I'm going through her stuff and getting rid of everything that's just…bad," she said. She picked up one of my favorite sweaters with the tips of her fingers as though it was dirty and she was afraid hold it and then dropped it carelessly to the floor. "Which, so far, seems to be…well, everything,"

"I want you to stop and get out of her room. Right now," he said, looking at her from underneath his eyebrows, again, very calmly.

She placed her hands on her hips and flipped her hair back over her shoulder. "Logan, I'm doing this for you, don't you get it?" she asked with a tone in her voice that hinted at her starting to lose her patients. "No, I don't suppose you do, do you? She's dead, you saw her die, she's not coming back and you're going to have to just get over it,"

"I'm gonna' tell you one more time to get out of her room,"

"Seriously, it's been like a month already, you're going to have to make a choice Logan; her or me?"

"Her," he said. He didn't bat an eye nor pause a second to contemplate his answer; it was his automatic, his truth. "Now get out,"

"Or what, what are you going to do?" she asked him, far too over confident in herself. You see, Haylie had only known that Logan's mutation was incredibly fast rejuvenating abilities, she was blatantly oblivious to the fact that he had metal surgically grafted to every bone in his body and that at will, he could pop out six, three to each hand, cleverly place, and curiously long, claws. She was apparently clueless to Wolverine's short fuse and quick temper or otherwise she wouldn't have been taunting him quite the way that she was. And so when Logan pushed her into the closet door and extended one claw close enough to her throat, without actually touching it, it would naturally elicit and ear piercing yell for help.

It didn't take long before Jean and Rogue were both running into the room.

"Logan, it's okay, why don't you take a step back and tell me what's wrong?" Jean said, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"I don't want to talk about it, you know what she did, now leave me alone,"

"You are _not_ going to hurt her, so why don't you at least retract your claw and move back just a little bit,"

"Look what she did to her room,"

"I know that you wanted to keep it the way that it was and I know that you're extremely upset. I don't understand exactly how you feel Logan, I'm not going to pretend that I do, but I know that hurting Haylie isn't going to change anything that's happened,"

"Why are you so calm? He's going to _kill_ me!" Haylie shrieked dramatically.

"He's not going to kill you, he's just angry with you right now,"

"I've been angry with her since she got here Jean, you know that,"

"I know, but just listen to me Logan, let her go with Marie and the two of us can talk about it. When you calm down, you can speak to her and explain why you're so angry with her,"

"Why don't I just tell her right now?"

"Okay, you can, but I think it would be better if you didn't have your claw out, alright, can you at least put that away?"

He stood there for a moment longer before retracting his single claw, but didn't move.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" Haylie screamed at him.

"Haylie, keep your voice down," Jean said to her.

"Don't tell me to keep my voice down; he was just threatening to kill me!"

"He was not threatening to kill you; he was just trying to get you to stop talking so that you would leave,"

"He could have asked me to leave!"

"I did," he said.

"He did," Jean said at the same time as Logan.

"Well why is he so mad at me?" she shrieked, holding her neck where Logan's claw had been pointed, but never touched.

"Aside from the face that you've complete trashed Chloe's room?" Rogue said from a few feet away.

"I wasn't trashing it, I was cleaning it out," she snapped.

"If we can all calm down, then I think we can talk this through, but right now we can't do anything," Jean said, keeping her hand on Logan's shoulder.

"Fine, because I want to know exactly why I've just been harassed by my own boyfriend,"

"I'm not your boyfriend," Logan said, raising his voice and shaking his head with anger. "Don't you get that?"

"So what have these past few weeks been about then, were you just leading me on?"

"I never said anything to make you think that. I can't stand you,"

"What? Were you just using me then, just so you could make Rogue mad?"

"I needed someway to have your father put back into jail and you were the only way I could have done it. So yeah, I was usin' you,"

"So you didn't care about me at all, everything was fake, even when you were kissing me in the car yesterday, it was just a joke?"

"It wasn't a joke, none of us found it funny, but Logan didn't know any other way to have him sent back to prison,"

She looked around in overly dramatic shock. "You were all in on this, weren't you?"

None of them replied to the question.

"Haylie, I think it might be better if you just went home right now," Jean said calmly.

"No, I want to talk to Professor Xavier about what's going on here and how he's running this school,"

"Alright, fine, Rogue, go and get the Professor, tell him that Haylie would like to speak with him,"

Rogue shot Haylie a rude look as she turned to leave the room. Jean removed her hand from Logan's shoulder and he moved to follow Marie out the door.

"Well where are you going, I thought we were going to talk this out?" Haylie called after him.

"I gotta' go talk to someone, Jean and Chuck'll fill you in on everything you need to know and they won't try to kill you," he said, adding sarcasm to his voice at the end.

He went straight to his room, found the shirt that he had thrown down just minutes before and pulled it back on, tucking it in after buttoning it and before he pulled on his leather jacket. He grabbed his car keys and jogged down the steps, taking two at a time, feeling the itchy feeling that he just needed out. He sped out of the school in his car as fast as he could, his mind reeling back and forth between being extremely angry with Haylie to being upset that my room was no longer how I had left it. What he had wanted was simple; to keep things how they had been before I left, but she had completely and utterly turned everything around from the way they were while I was there. She was talented; she had somehow managed to piss off all of the adults, even the Professor. To a certain degree, I was impressed. She had single handedly irritated everyone at the school, all while thinking that everyone loved her. That's one heck of a self-esteem if you ask me.

_I woke up at 5 a.m.  
Hearing your voice again  
But it was just the TV  
Coming from the other room. _

Your half-empty coffee cup  
Is sitting right where it was  
I almost moved it last night  
But it didn't feel right.  
It's too soon, it's too soon.  
It still feels like

You were just here  
You were just holding me  
I was alright  
I never would have believed  
That you'd go away  
That you could just disappear  
When you were just here.

The calendar on the wall  
Doesn't miss you at all  
It still says you'll be there  
With us all on Christmas Eve.

The picture you hung last week  
Keeps staring back at me  
There we are still laughin'  
Like nothin' ever happened.  
I still feel you in the air  
It's not fair, it's not fair.

_You were just here  
You were just holding me  
I was all right  
I never would have believed  
That you'd go away  
That you could just disappear  
When you were just here. _

I reach out and you're not there  
But I still feel you everywhere.  
No matter how much I try  
Or how hard I cry  
It still feels like

You were just here  
You were just holding me  
I was alright  
I never would have believed  
That you'd go away  
That you could just disappear  
When you were just here.

Once Logan arrived at the cemetery, he made the short walk to my grave, the sight of the stone bringing up just as much pain as it had the first time he had seen it.

"Hey," he started. "I know it's been a while since I've been out here, but I've been kind'a busy. We uh, found your father and he's gonna' go to court tomorrow. Chuck said it was on the news, I didn't watch it, but they said he was gonna' plead guilty or whatever, so you're not gonna' have to worry about him anymore, we've taking care of it. I would've brought you some flowers or something, but I kind'a left the house in a hurry, so I'm sorry," he took a deep breath and ran his hands back through his hair. "Uh, your room is a little messed up; Haylie was goin' through all of your stuff before I could stop her. I'm sorry about that, I wanted to keep it the same for you, but I don't think that's possible anymore. I don't know why I let you go, darlin', you meant a lot to me kid, you still do, but I was stupid and should have known that what I wanted was you. I keep makin' excuses about how scared I was that you were gonna' start seeing me differently, how I really am, and you wouldn't want to be with me, but you knew me and didn't care. There's nothing I wouldn't give to get you back, Chloe, just so I can tell you how much I love you and that I'm sorry. I let you down, all of the men in your life let you down and I wanted to be different, I wasn't gonna' do that to you, but I did. I wanted you to be happy. I know you had it rough and I just wanted to make everything better for you, I don't know if you ever knew it or not, but I wanted to give you everything. I know you didn't want me to 'cause you wanted to earn everything you go. You did, you had it hard and you worked hard, kid. I'm sorry I didn't always tell you what I thought about you, but I uh…I was proud of you, I still am. You and Marie grew up and you did good with your lives, and I'm proud of both of you. I just wish I would've told you so that you knew. I know I usually come here and end up yellin' at you for leavin' me, but it wasn't your fault and I'm sorry that I blamed you. Look, I don't know what to say, I miss you so badly baby, I can't sleep anymore without dreamin' about you. It still hurts to not be able to hold you when I want, I missed bein' able to watch you sleep. I'm not sure if you knew it, but I used to watch you sleepin' a lot. I could always rest better when I knew that you were all right. I just wanted to take care of you and make you happy, that's all I wanted,"

"You did," I said from behind him and he turned around and looked at me. He moved backwards, leaned up against my headstone, and because it was Logan, I let him do it.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," I said back with a small smile.

"What happened to your hair?" he asked, noting that it was red.

I reached up and touched it. "I needed a change," I said.

He nodded his head. "I like it better the other way,"

"Me too,"

Our reunion was not going quite as I had planned.

_You oughta see the way these people look at me  
When they see me 'round here talking to this stone. _

Everybody thinks I've lost my mind  
But I just take it day by day.

I probably wouldn't be this way  
I probably wouldn't hurt so bad  
I never pictured every minute without you in it  
Oh you left so fast.  
Sometimes I see you standing there  
Sometimes I feel an angel's touch  
Sometimes I feel like I'm so lucky to have had the chance to  
love this much.  
God gave me a moment's grace  
'Cause if I'd never seen your face  
I probably wouldn't be this way.


	10. Finding The Light

Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to anything Marvel or the lyrics to this song used in this, the final chapter, which is called 'Broken'. I know I used some of them before, but this is the full song and it still fits in with the whole thing. I've got a virus and I've been sick and I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to type this chapter up for a while, but I got some good medicine and was able to do so. I hope everyone has liked the story so far and I hope that you enjoy the last chapter!

* * *

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," I said back with a small smile.

"What happened to your hair?" he asked, noting that it was red.

I reached up and touched it. "I needed a change," I said.

He nodded his head. "I like it better the other way,"

"Me too,"

Our reunion was not going quite as I had planned. Allow me to introduce, erm, _re_-introduce myself; my name is Emma O'Brien, I'm from Ireland and if you ask me if I'm related to Conan O'Brien I might just scream. In those four weeks, I had lived with a very nice girl named Brooke who worked for the FBI. I was born the day that Chloe died. Let me explain; I died in Logan's arms, I stopped breathing, my heart quit beating but when the ambulance arrived and I was loaded into it, I was given a shot of adrenalin, shocked in the chest with a defibrillator and my heart began beating again. I'm not sure if it was just the shock alone that brought me back, or if it was the other electricity from my mutation along with it, but I was not only alive, but also came to and was quite aware of myself in the ambulance. The paramedics applied pressure bandages to my gun shot wound and helped to get it stopped from bleeding everywhere. When I got to the hospital I was treated for the wound in my stomach and, surprisingly to everyone working on the floor of the trauma unit, I was no longer in critical condition after just a couple of hours. However, during those two hours I had to speak to police officers who convinced me that I should go into a witness protection/relocation program of sorts. As my father was still on the loose, they said I could go back home because it might have put everyone else in danger, and so with the help of Brooke, the FBI agent, and her partner Agent Saunders; we created Emma O'Brien and cleaned the slate of Chloe Rynolds. I understood that going home and showing that I was alive would be a bad idea, and so I was easily convinced to not go back. But I had been told that there was a huge manhunt going on to search for him, I wasn't told, however, that once he crossed the United States boarder, they wouldn't do anymore to help catch him. I had to change me; I dyed my hair red, wore green colored contacts, dressed different and the most difficult to remember to keep up; I had to learn how to speak with an Irish accent. And so, after a month, I began to wonder if I would ever get to go back home. I received frequent updates on how Logan was doing through the Professor as he and Jean naturally knew of my situation. I would feel guilty about how he was dealing with my so-called 'passing' and yet I felt morbidly happy at times, knowing that his intense grieving meant that he loved me. So when I had been informed the day before by Professor Xavier that they had caught my father, he said that Logan and Jean, along with my half-sister Haylie, had gone to Canada to set him up so that the police could arrest him. Chuck said that Logan had been relentless in finding a way to get him sent back to jail, all because I had said that that's what I had wanted. It was torture having to wait to get clearance to go back home. I had to wait for them to have my father in US custody and then he had to admit that he was guilty. That was the easy part; he was proud that he had almost killed me. There was a hard decision I had to make after he had told them why he had tried to kill me. He told them the truth, because I was a mutant, and I had to choose between telling the truth and lying. If I lied, I could hide myself, keep it secret, but it would give his lawyer a chance to convince the judge that he had a mental illness and he could get a light sentence. However, if I told the truth I would not only be out in the open about being a mutant, but also because he had gotten only a thirteen-year sentence murdering and abusing a corpse of a mutant before, I thought that the charges of an attempted murder without any extra charges would barely be a slap on the hand. Of course, I took into consideration that he would more than likely be charged with a hate crime, but altogether, I knew it wouldn't be a very long sentence for him. I had changed me to the point I wasn't even speaking in my own accent anymore and so I decided that if the only thing I could keep from Chloe that couldn't be taken away no matter what name I was being called or color my hair was, was the fact that I was a mutant, I could keep it and be proud of it. Which is why in the end, I told the police that I was a mutant and that indeed had been why he had tried to kill me. Once that had been settled, I was told that I could go home, as long as I didn't make a big deal about it. When I found out, got all of my things together and was on my way to the mansion, the Professor said that Logan was at the cemetery and that's where Brooke and Agent Saunders drove me.

To what degree is it okay to deceive someone? Is it okay to put yourself into a position to possibly hurt someone if the end effect could somehow help to bring the big picture all together? Is it okay to make someone believe in something untrue when you know that it's a lie but you know that it's all for a very good purpose? What if what you were doing even hurt you, could you do it? Could you make everyone you know believe it? There's a quote that says; 'What the eyes see and the ears here the mind believes.' This theory had been put to the test and had proved to be true.

I walked up to Logan, expecting him to turn around and be extremely happy to see me, but instead, he seemed oddly expectant to see me. If you've ever read the book 'Peter Pan' that perhaps you remember the part at the end where once the Darling children had come home and were in their beds, Mrs. Darling had imagined and seen them in their beds so many times, that once they were really there, she didn't realize it was actually them. That was what was happening to Logan at that moment; he had seen me so many times that he just assumed that he was only seeing me and that I wasn't really there. However, I wasn't aware of the fact that he had been seeing me at that time and to be quite honest, I was confused and a little upset that he was being so calm and casual about seeing me for the first time in a month.

"I missed you," I said, trying not to cry.

"I miss you, too,"

"Well then, can I, uh…" I said, doing my best to keep my voice calm.

"Can you what?"

"Can I hug you, or touch you, or something?"

"Yeah," he said, nodding his head and stood up from where he was leaning against my tombstone. I walked over to him and wrapped my arms around his neck. I felt his hands across my back. "You're warm," he said, sounding confused.

"I'm freezing," I said, finally letting the tears that I had been trying so hard to hold back, fall down my face.

He moved me back, holding me out at arms length. He frantically ran his hands over my face, back through my hair, over my arms. He looked at me scared, and bewildered and confused. There was a moment before it clicked and realized that I was real and there, and that's when tears rimed his eyes. He opened his mouth to say something, but shut it and just shook his head.

"Logan, I am _so_ sorry, I wanted you to know that I was okay, but I couldn't no one was supposed to know,"

"What happened?" he asked, holding my face in his hands, which I held to me.

"When they got me into the ambulance, they shocked my heart and I came back. The bullet missed hitting anything major, it went through real clean and once they got me to the hospital and hooked up to everything, I was okay,"

"But I buried you," he said, his eyes wide with disbelief, the tears finally spilling out onto his face.

"I know, we had to pretend that Chloe died so that my father wouldn't know that I was alive,"

"_You're_ Chloe,"

I shook my head. "No, I'm Emma now," I said, talking through my tears.

"What?"

"The FBI had this fake body-double thing made up to look like me, that's what you buried. Since everyone thought I was dead, I had to be someone else,"

He ran his hand back across my face and into my hair. "You're here, though?"

"Yeah, I'm really here," I said with a small smile. "I'm so sorry though, I didn't mean to," I began to apologize, but didn't get to finish as he cut me off with his mouth, crushing down on mine and kissing me. He pulled me to him, as close as he could, holding me tightly. I could taste cigars and something spicy in his mouth, mixed with the salty taste of both of our tears. I wrapped my hands up into his hair, pulling his mouth closer to mine. It hadn't been what I had wanted for a month, or two or three. I had wanted and waited for him to kiss me the way that he was since I had seen him six months before. I had dreamed about him kissing me that way since I had realized that I was in love with him. While I was gone, I thought and wondered if he loved and missed me as much as I did him. However, with the way that I was feeling as he held and kissed me so passionately, with such demand and urgency, it rebuked any doubt I may have ever had that what he felt for me was anything less than the strongest love I had ever felt.

We were more than just two people kissing; we were so much more than that. For him, he was given a second chance to right his wrong of letting me go, to fix the mistakes he had made when it came to me. For him it was answers to the prayers that he didn't believe would ever be answered. I was his hope, walking, standing, talking, touching him. I was touching him and it wasn't cold and faint. I was real and tangible and there. I was there with him, holding him and kissing him, just wanting him. For him it was hope for a future he had pictured and dreamed of me being in. I was everything that was good in the world and I was all his, there was no question about it; I belonged to him. For me, I felt like I was finally home.

After a few minutes, I had to pull away so that I could breathe. We both just stared at each other for a moment, what was there to say appropriate for the situation right then?

"I love you darlin'," he said to me.

"I love you, too," I said back, once again wrapping my arms around his neck.

"No, I mean it Chloe, I do,"

"I know, I believe you," I whispered to him.

"Don't ever do that to me again, kid,"

"I won't,"

"I went crazy without you," he said, placing kisses on my hair, face and neck. "I missed you,"

"I missed you too and I promise I won't ever leave you again. I promise, I promise," I said, clinging to him tightly.

"You can't leave me," he said, pressing his mouth to my ear.

"Will you take me home?"

"Can I?"

"Yeah," I said, nodding my head slightly. "I was going home when the Professor told me that you were here and I wanted to see you as soon as I could,"

He moved my head back away from the crook of his neck gently and gave me a small, sweet kiss that brought tears to my eyes. "So, do I get to keep you this time?" he asked, inhaling my scent. His lips lightly grazed mine as he nuzzled my nose with his. I could feel the heat of his breath on my mouth as he spoke and the weight of his words fell heavy on my heart. He wanted to keep me.

"Only if I get to keep you," I said back.

He kissed me once again. "You ain't ever gettin' rid of me, darlin', you're stuck with me now,"

I smiled at him. He had missed my smile so much. "I guess it could be worse,"

"How?" he asked with a bit of a smirk.

"Well, I could be stuck _without_ you forever,"

He shook his head. "We're not gonna' try that,"

"I thought," I said and then paused. I didn't want to spoil our mood but I felt it needed to be discussed. "I thought you didn't want this, I thought you were scared to hurt me?"

He held my face in his hand and looked me right in the eye. "This is what I've wanted for a long time and I'm never gonna' hurt you,"

"And Wolverine always gets what he wants,"

He gave me a small smile and nodded his head. "I can't live without you again, I tried that for a while and I didn't like it,"

"My dear Logan, you've gone all poetic on me," I said teasingly with a smile.

"Whatever you want," he said.

I placed my hand on his shoulder. "You're shaking," I said worried.

"I'm fine," he assured me. "Let me take you home,"

I nodded my head and he wiped the tears that were left on my face with the pad of his thumb. "Okay,"

He walked me, with his arm wrapped around my shoulder, to Agent Saunders's car.

"You must be Logan," he said, reaching out to shake his hand. "I'm Agent Saunders; I've been taking care of Emma for you,"

"Chloe," Logan corrected.

"Legally she's Emma O'Brien now,"

"But everyone can still call me Chloe though, yeah?" I asked.

"Yes, but try not to out in public," Brooke said, handing me my only two bags of clothes that the Agency had bought for me. Where I had once wore jeans, a T-shirt and sneakers, I had been remodeled into an argyle sweater, pencil skirt, ballet flats person.

"Does she get to change her hair back?" Logan asked.

"Yes, as soon as we find out the ruling on her father, even though she'll be Emma, everything can go back to normal," said Brooke.

'_Normal,'_ I thought. _'It will never be _normal_ again.'_ And it was true. The person that I had worked so hard on becoming in my near twenty-three years of life was dead and I had to start all over again from scratch.

"Can I ride with him?" I asked, motioning to Logan. They exchanged looks with one another. "He's not going to run off with me or anything, we'll be going straight home, I promise,"

"I think…it'll be okay, we're going to follow you and we'll walk you into your house, though. After that, you're going to have to stay put until we hear the ruling on your father's case. Once that happens, we'll keep a look out on your home and you for about a month, if there's nothing suspicious, then you can slowly start doing things out in the public again. But until then, you're going to have to be on a house arrest type thing for a while," Agent Saunders said.

"Oh, I'm not going to mind having to stay in the house for a while; I'm just excited to get to see everyone again,"

"Okay, Agent Peters, why don't you ride with them and I'll follow you in my car," he said to Brooke.

She nodded her head, went to the passenger's side of the car and grabbed her purse. She checked to make sure her gun was still in place and then we all got into our cars and started our way to the mansion.

"How is everyone, what all's been going on while I've been away, is there any big news that I've missed of anything?" I asked as me were driving. Logan held my hand tightly, not wanting to let go.

"Well, me and Marie were havin' an affair," he said very casually.

"What?" I asked slightly confused.

He let out a small laugh. "Something someone started,"

"Who?"

He looked over at me. "Has Chuck been talkin' to you?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Did he tell you about Haylie?"

"Yeah, she's my half-sister," I said, then realized what he meant. "_She_ said that; why would she do that to you and Rogue?"

"Because she's a bi-" he started.

"_Without_ swearing,"

"She's a spoiled little brat,"

"Wait a minute, who's Chuck and how have you been talking to him?" Brooke asked from the back seat.

"Chuck is Professor Xavier, the guy you talked to who owns the school. He told you that he was a mutant as well, a telepath, which means he can speak to people through thought." The Professor had told them that he was a telepath to show that I would not only be okay there at the house with him, but if anything was going to happen, he would know and he would inform them, who could inform the police. "He would tell me what was going on at home every now and then, but he failed to mention that rumor. How do you know that she started it?"

"'Cause she said she did,"

"She _told_ you; is she _completely_ thick?"

"Yeah," he said then picked up my hand and kissed it.

"So did he make her leave after that, or what?"

"No,"

"I can't believe the Professor would actually let her stay there after starting a rumor like that. Why didn't he make her leave?"

"I talked him out of it,"

"Why?" I asked, looking over at him.

"No…no, no, kid, I was…" he said, pausing and clearing his throat.

"Yes, you were…what? The Professor told me what she looks like Logan, although I was a little disappointed at the thought of you hooking up with the sister I never knew I had, I wasn't completely in denial about the whole idea. I mean, she is your type,"

"Which is what?"

"Female and breathing," I said and Agent Peters laughed from the back seat.

"Yeah, well, the only reason I did anything with her was because of you,"

"How's that?"

"You told me that you wanted your father to go back to jail and made me promise not to kill him. So me and Jean decided that since she liked me so much she could be put to some use and actually help us do something, instead of just takin' up space and eatin' our food,"

"Well, she must like you because of all of your _charm_," I said sarcastically. The longer that I was with him, the more right it felt and it seemed as though I hadn't been gone at all. "So you basically lied to and used her for your own selfish benefit?"

He shook his head and smirked at me. "Yeah, pretty much,"

"At least I know that the cranky little Canadian I fell in love with is still intact even through everything you've been through in the past four weeks," I said and he smiled at me.

I ran my fingers between his knuckles, massaging the skin there. There was a strong sense of power when I would touch his hands. There was enough metal to kill anyone just under the surface, and yet he chose to allow me to hold and caress his hands. I held his hand with no fear and I always would.

The ride to the school was nice and easy with conversation, mostly consisting of the two of us picking at and making fun of one another. Before we got home, Professor Xavier sent and told me that he had informed the whole school what was going on so that I wouldn't scare anyone when I got there. When we finally pulled into the drive and I watched the mansion become bigger the closer we got to it, my heart start speeding up at the anticipation of finally being there.

"Wow, it's huge," Brooke said, looking out the window as we drove up to the front.

I let out a happy sigh. "It's _home_," I said. No matter how melodramatic or sappy movie dialog it may have sounded, it was true.

When we parked, I felt as if I couldn't get out of the car fast enough. However, I had to wait on both Agent Saunders and Agent Peters to walk me up to the door and inside the school, where I was met, surprisingly, by Rogue. Rogue, Bobby and Storm were there waiting for me as the four of us walked through the front door. I gave Storm and Bobby hugs and they both told me how much they missed me, but when I got to Rogue, I didn't know what to do.

"The Professor said you've been taking care of Logan while I was gone," I said to her.

"Yeah, well, you tore him up quite a bit, he needed me,"

"He still does," I said.

"Look, I'm sorry, I know that I wasn't real nice to you while you were here, but I'm sorry, I'm glad that you're back, at least now he won't have to drink so much," she said with a small smile.

"Don't worry about it, it couldn't be farther from my mind right now," I said and she gave me a hug, careful not to touch me with the exposed skin around her neck.

"Welcome back home,"

"Thank you,"

I went to the Professor's office and he welcomed me back before I went upstairs to see Dr. Grey and Scott. Brooke and Agent Saunders stayed behind to speak to Chuck about all of my rules and everything that I needed to follow for caution.

As I walked up the familiar steps that I had climbed countless times in my dreams that month alone, I met a few of the student, most of which were the ones that I had recruited, and they all hugged me and told me how happy they were to have me back. I walked down the long hall, which was nearly quiet, as most of the students were getting ready to go to sleep because they had classes the next morning. I turned the corner that led to the staff hall, _my_ hall, and I heard faint voices coming from my room. I then saw my door open and Scott step out into the hallway. He beamed his brilliant smile when he saw me and I ran to him.

"Scotty!" I said, wrapping my arms around his neck, hugging him. He hugged me back, lifting me off of the floor.

"We missed you, kiddo," he said to me.

"I missed you guys, too," I said, starting to cry again.

"Hey," I heard a voice say beside me. Scott sat me back down and I saw Jean standing in my doorway, smiling and crying at the same time.

"Hey," I said, going to hug her too.

"We're so glad that you're back,"

"Me too," I said as she let go of me and I caught a glimpse of my room. "Not to change the subject, but what happened, it looks like a tornado hit it,"

"It was something much worse than a tornado," Scott said to me quietly.

"Like what?"

"I hope that you are all proud of everything that you've done. You've lied to me, deceived me, used me and pretty much humiliated me the whole time I've been here," Haylie said, walking from her room with her bags in tow. "Scott, are you not even going to help me carry my bags out to the car? You are a man, that's what you're supposed to do,"

"I was aware that Scott's job was teaching, not bell boy, though I have been away for a while, so I suppose things could have changed since then," I remarked. Though I didn't know who she was right then, I knew I didn't like her.

"And who are you?" she asked smartly.

"Emma O'Brien," I said, putting on my Irish accent. "And who are _you_?"

"Haylie Robbins," she said, walking closer to us.

"_You're_ Haylie," I said, nodding my head, finally understanding. "I've just been told quite a bit about you,"

"By who?"

"Me," Logan said, walking up behind me.

"Oh, did he try to kill you, too?" she asked me.

"You tried to kill her?" I asked Logan, turning around to him.

"Yes, he had this metal claw thing that came out of his hand and he had it against my throat,"

"Just one? He has five other and I'm quite impressed; I've pissed him off quite a few times and he's never threatened my life…unless you count getting in a car with him," I said.

She looked at me confused. "Wait…you…you look like Chloe,"

"It's because I am,"

"But you're dead,"

"Well, that can't be possible, now can, because obviously I'm standing right here in front of you,"

"So you're not even dead, you all lied to me about that too?" she shrieked.

"What exactly has been going on that Logan tried to kill you and they lied to you about?"

"He tried to kill me because I was cleaning out your room to help him get over you because _we_ were supposed to be going out,"

"So you're the one who did this to my room?" I asked, pointing through my open door.

"Jean's actually cleaned most of it up," Scott said.

"Thank you," I told Jean, my Irish accent thickening as I became more used to it once again.

"I want an explanation," Haylie demanded.

"And I want a convertible, that doesn't mean I'm going to get it, now does it?" I said with a smirk.

"I have been _used_; wait until my father hears about this, he'll sue you!"

"For what? I'm sure you're father would love to hear what you're doing here in a house full of mutants. I could be guessing here, but I say judging from what I've heard of and from you, daddy-dearest doesn't know his little girl is a freak of nature,"

"You don't know anything about _me_," she said.

"Well I know that apparently you've been 'used' and you get quite the kick out of starting rumors about _my_ friends, but perhaps I've not been informed of the proper information,"

She stood there staring at us all before she spat; "You're really not all that pretty," at me.

I heard the three of them all take in deep breaths, getting ready to reprimand her for her comment, but I spoke first. "Well, it's a good thing that my self worth doesn't rely on what other people think of me, isn't it? Otherwise I might actually care about what you have to say about me, which, to be quite honest with you, I don't,"

"Well, if you think that you're just going to come in here and take Logan away from me, you can have him, I don't care, but whether they admit it or not, he and Rogue have a little something going on with each other," she said with a smirk. "Just so you know,"

"Logan and Marie have known each other for nearly seven years, there's more than 'a little something' going on between them, that's how they are. But I suppose you don't know them well enough to understand that, do you? Because if you did, you wouldn't have confused it with having an affair,"

"So you all planned this and you were all in on it? You set me up and tricked me to meet out psychotic, murder father who could have _killed_ me!"

"It's not _that_ bad, sweetheart," I said.

"How do you know?" she shrieked.

"Because he _did_ kill me,"

It took a while for us to all work through everything enough to finally understand what was going on and to explain to Haylie that she was not the only one who thought that I was dead and it wasn't just to 'trick' her into meeting anyone. After about an hour, everything in my room was back in place, Haylie was sent home and everyone went to bed. Except for Logan and me. They all left us up so that we could spend more time together. I was hungry so we went down to the kitchen so that I could eat some of the leftovers from dinner.

"I got the rose you left me on Valentine's Day,"

"I left it the day before,"

"I know,"

"Did Chuck tell you?"

"No…I saw you," He looked at me confused for a moment. "I thought you knew; you were staring at the car when we left. I went down there to check the grave because I wanted to keep anything that was left on it. I saw your car pull up and I wanted to stay so badly but they made me leave. I got to see you when we were driving away,"

I was the woman with the red hair that he had seen getting into the back car. He shook his head. "That was you?"

I smiled. "So you did see me?"

"Yeah,"

There was a bit of silence for a moment. "What's going on?"

He darted his eyes back and forth, looking into mine. "What do you mean?"

"Today's been kind of complicated and I don't really know what's going on now,"

"You mean this," he said, motioning his hand between us. "What's goin' on with us?"

I pushed around the food on my plate with my fork and then looked up at him in the eye. "Yeah," I said, nodding my head. "I mean, was what went on just because we missed each other or…what?"

"No,"

"So we're…together now?"

"Do you not want us to be?"

I gave him a small smile. "That's what I've wanted for a long time,"

"You've not changed your mind,"

"No, I've not changed my mind, but I don't want you to feel like you have to do this because I was gone and you feel like you have to make something up to me,"

"I don't think that,"

"So you still…" I paused, not knowing where to go with the conversation. I wanted to know how he really felt but I didn't want him to feel like I was pushing him to do something that he didn't actually want.

"I love you darlin'," he said, looking me straight in the eye. "I was stupid before and didn't do anything about it, but when you weren't here, when you were…when I _thought _you were gone, I know that what I did was a stupid mistake and I would have done anything to change it,"

Tears slide down my cheek and he wiped them away. "Why did you act like it was so normal to see me when I went up and talked to you?"

He brushed the hair from my face. "'Cause I had seen you before,"

"What?"

"I saw you in the hall just a day after your funeral, you were on my bed wantin' to try on my boots, you were in here lookin' out the window, I saw you in my room and you wouldn't let me hold you. When I saw you tonight, I didn't know it was really you,"

"You thought about me _that_ much?"

"You were all I was thinkin' about,"

I moved his hand from my face and kissed it. "So we're good then yeah, you and me? We're 'us' now?"

"We've been 'us' for a while darlin'," he said.

I let out a small laugh through my tears. "That's true,"

"Yeah, we're good," he said.

I stood from my stool and hugged him. "I love you, I love you, I love you," I whispered over and over in his ear.

"I love you too, baby,"

I pulled back, he stood up and he kissed me. There's no way for me to describe how it felt to finally feel comfortable, safe and loved after what I had gone through that month. My life had been full of ups and downs, never knowing quite where I was going to wind up next, after finding years of being shuffled to and from different states, homes and countries. But Logan had been there for me when he could since I met him and feeling his arms wrapped around me as he held and kissed me left me with a strong sense of safety and comfort. I loved him, I always had, and for me there was nothing better in the world than to have him showing just how much he loved me.

We alternated between talking, eating and kissing for the next hour and a half, after that I was so tired I nearly fell asleep in the kitchen, but he made me go to bed. Together we walked up the stairs, his arm around my shoulder and my arm around his waist. I didn't want to go to sleep, but I was too tied to argue that to him, so instead, we kissed for a few more minutes and then he sent me to bed.

It felt good to sleep in my own bed for once and I fell asleep fast, not able to keep my eyes open. My day had been so excited, but I knew that my excitement for seeing him was nothing compared to how he felt about having me back. He had spent four weeks, almost to the day, believing that I was dead, never to come back home. While I, on the other hand, had known full well that I was a live, a little sore through my stomach at times, but altogether, just fine.

I fell asleep knowing that the next day would be better, easier, because I was home. I had felt like the mansion was my home while I was there, but it took leaving it and everyone there to really understand what it felt like. When I had seen Logan again and he had shown me to my room for the first time, I looked at him and knew that he felt at home there, with the school and the actual people and I felt that he had betrayed me. We should have been living out on the road, with no special place in mind to go, but _together_ and he had settled down as a teacher? No, that wasn't Wolverine. Getting attached was weak, who needed other people, they only ever let you down. And then I became attached to the same exact people. Once that happened, I realized that I had never been mad at him, I had been jealous. My homecoming was something I would have never have imagined to have ever mattered to anyone, but it was my home, they were my family and I had never been happier in my life.

* * *

I woke up in a panic, looking around my room frantically. It took me a moment to realize that I was in my room. I had been having nightmares and that night was no exception. I sat up in bed, panting. There had barely been a sleep that passed where I hadn't seen my father pulling out his gun and shooting me. Though I had never actually _seen_ him pull out the gun at the time, my imagination filled in all of the details, and each time I would hear the crack of the gun in my dream, I would wake up with a pain shooting through my stomach. If I ever did try to go back to sleep, I would only see Logan holding me and crying, which caused more hurt to me than with the pain in my stomach.

I stood from my bed, there was no way that I could go back to sleep and I knew the one place that I could rest, so I left my room and padded down the hall. I opened the door to Logan's room and saw him lying in his bed, sleeping quietly. I stood there watching him for a moment; he looked so peaceful, which he hardly ever did, and so I wanted to see him where he was okay. There with nothing after him, nothing to hurt him or the people he loved. He wasn't an animal or an experiment. He wasn't someone that the world hated because he was different. When he slept, he was just a man.

I closed his door as quietly as I could and walked over to him. I folded the covers back carefully on the empty side of his bed and lay down facing him. He stirred a bit and then he opened his eyes sleepily.

"I had a bad dream, is this okay?"

"Yeah, it's fine," he said. He ran his hand across my cheek, down my arm and rested it at my stomach. My shirt had lifted some and he could see my scar. He carefully ran his hand across it. "Does it hurt?"

"Every now and then, it's getting better though,"

"Good,"

"Do you know what happened to the photo of us from the Christmas party, I had it in my room but it's not there anymore,"

"It's over there," he said, pointing behind me to his nightstand.

I looked over at it and smiled. I had loved that photo and wanted Dr. Grey to send me a copy of it while I was gone, but I wasn't allowed to ask for anything from how. "We're an awfully good looking couple, aren't we?" I joked to him.

"We're a couple and you're good lookin', so yeah," he said and I laughed.

"You're not too terribly shappy yourself there Wolvie," I said and then saw the book that was sitting on his nightstand. "Is that my journal?"

"Uh, yeah," he said.

I looked back over at him. "Were you reading _my_ journal?" I asked in mock shock.

"Well, I didn't think you were ever gonna' find out about it," he said with a bit of a smirk.

"So did you find out anything of any interest about me that you didn't already know?"

"Yeah,"

"And what was that?"

"I was in love with you first,"

"Are you sure about that?" I asked.

"Oh yeah, you lost me way back in October," he smirked.

I smiled and blushed at the thought of Logan, _Wolverine_, being 'lost in love' with anyone, but especially me.

"Well, to be quite fair, I was in love with you when I got here, but I didn't want to admit it just yet,"

"Doesn't count,"

"Why not?"

"'Cause I win,"

"Only because I let you," I smiled. "And besides, you should have fallen in love with me first, I'm _much_ more charming than you are," I said sarcastically.

"I'm not gonna' argue with that,"

"You should,"

"Why?"

"Because you _are_ quite charming, I mean, hey, you got me to fall in love with you and in case you haven't noticed, past experiences prove that I should be very jaded and cynical about the whole love thing,"

He grabbed my hand and held it against his chest, to his heart. "I'm not gonna' hurt you like they did,"

"I know that, I know you're not them and I trust you completely," I said and he pulled our bodies closer together, holding me. He kissed me on top of my head. We were quiet for a few moments as we lay together, just happy to finally have the other one back again. "You know, I could get used to this; I might do it for a while," I said.

"I could do this for the rest of my life," he breathed in my ear.

I blushed and pulled back to look at his face. "Mr. Logan that sounded like a proposal" I joked with a smile.

"That _was_ the idea," he said, brushing the hair from my face.

"Really?"

"Yeah,"

I nodded my head slowly. "Okay,"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," I smiled. There was another stretch of silence as I thought about what had just happened. "So we're engaged now, then?"

He smiled and I couldn't help but remember the very first time I had seen him smile at me. So many things had changed since then and yet so much was the same. "Well, I've not proposed to anyone in a while but I think that when I do and you say 'yeah' that's what it means," he smirked.

I thought for a moment. "I'm okay with that," I nodded.

"Me too, kid,"

"Okay, but _that_ has to stop; we can _not_ get married and you call me kid, that's just a little bit creepy," I said and he laughed.

"I'll see what I can do," he said, pulling me back closer to him, wrapping his arms around me.

We didn't sleep much that night; we just stayed awake talking. As the early March sun rose over the trees of the forest just out beyond his balcony, he watched me sleep. The situation that we both thought would year us apart, had pulled us together. We had gotten to start all over again with our lives, our second chance, and he was going with it. He held my sleeping body in his arms, relishing in the feeling. He wondered how I managed to do what I did to him. How had I, that talkative, blonde teenager, turned into a woman that at the mere sight of me made his chest puff out with pride because I was his? To someone that when I spoke, it pulled him in, hanging on every word that I said. Out of all of the years that he had remembered of his life, he knew that all of the woman he had thought he loved, he had never felt once for them what he had for me. He thought that he had loved Jean, but it had just been lust. Not that he wasn't attracted to me as he was her, but with me, there was something different, something more.

If you're expecting me to say 'And they all lived happily ever after,' I'm afraid that I'm not going to. Because, you see, that would mean that it was over with and done, when, in fact, it wasn't. We were only at the start, just beginning and I couldn't have been more excited about seeing how our life would go. For once, I had something to look forward to and as far as I could see; it looked pretty good.

_I wanted you to know I love the way you laugh  
I wanna hold you high and steal your pain away.  
I keep your photograph and I know it serves me well  
I wanna hold you high and steal your pain. _

'Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome  
And I don't feel right when you're gone away.

You've gone away, you don't feel me anymore.

The worst is over now and we can breathe again  
I wanna hold you high, you steal my pain away.  
There's so much left to learn, and no one left to fight  
I wanna hold you high and steal your pain.

'Cause I'm broken when I'm open  
And I don't feel like I am strong enough.  
'Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome  
And I don't feel right when you're gone away.

'Cause I'm broken when I'm lonesome  
And I don't feel right when you're gone away.

You've gone away  
You don't feel me here anymore.

The End.


End file.
